I started with an early morning meeting of the Southwest California Economic Development Corporation where we were treated to remarks by John Rossi, General Manager of Western Municipal Water District. Apologizing for depressing us, John presented a factual summary of where our state is waterwise and how the water districts are dealing with our current situation. Having toured the Northern end of our state water supply system last year from Oroville Dam to LA, and having written about the issue on numerous occasions, I believe that rather than being depressed we should see this as a call to action. As Rossi did when he encouraged us not only to use our resources wisely but to engage our legislators in recognizing the complexity of the issue and dealing with it comprehensively.

With over 70% of SoCal water deriving from the north, another 25% from the Colorado River and about 5% from ground water & desalinization,  it’s clear where the answer lies. Prayer. But in addition to prayer, the water department is also working legislatively through the current ’special session’ to address both conservation and infrastructure issues. Until and if those solutions ever bear fruit, they will also continue to squeeze their customers. Oh, by the way, if those solutions do bear fruit, they will still continue to squeeze their customers. Why? Because they can. And any fix – even the inadequate Democrat proposals, will come with a big price tag that somebody has to pay for.

Here’s a fun factoid. During the past year our primary wholesale supplier of water, Metropolitan Water District, has instituted rate increases of nearly 40%. These increases were designed to encourage conservation – a very admirable goal and one that will certainly help us deal with the problem. There’s another 20% increase due in a month or two. Why? Because our conservation efforts have been so successful at reducing water consumption that Metropolitan has less revenue coming in to service their bond debt and fixed expenses. So they need to raise rates again because the first rate increases were so successful at changing our consumption habits. Damned if you do, damned if you don’t. Is there a win-win in here anywhere?

Think our bills will go down anytime soon? The you should have been to the EWDC luncheon featuring Senator John Benoit and Assemblymembers Brian Nestande and Kevin Jeffries. The operative words here were also ‘depressing’ and/or ‘frustrating’ by turns, for the state’s economic outlook, any chance for real reform and for the water picture.

Assemblymember Jeffries, who was appointed to the state special commission on water, remains hopeful that some compromise solution will be reached soon, possibly as early as this coming week. He bemoaned the fact that water has become so politicized that true progress remains elusive. While the party in power in Sacramento thinks the problem can be solved by merely conserving more and restoring the Delta, the minority view prefers conservation coupled with additional infrastructure to provide long-term solutions. Capturing and storing rainfall and snowpack for future use, channeling current water resources without adversely impacting the Delta Estuary, new dams, an alternative conveyance AND continued conservation are all part of a comprehensive solution.

Our current drought is caused in equal parts by nature and regulation. Our dams truly are down by 1/2 to 2/3rds as a result of rainfall & snowpack the past few years. It is regulatory by virtue of the fact that judicial decree has determined the rights of the Delta Smelt take precedence over 18 million water users, farmers and food producers throughout the central and southern parts of the state. There are also complex water rights issues with people at the watershed source and with environmental groups concerned about preservation of the Delta. It wouldn’t be an easy fix even on a level playing field – given the way our legislature operates it’s a wonder anything happens at all.

All panelists agreed that jobs are the answer for our state. “Not bigger government, not more taxes, more jobs”, according to Senator Benoit.  ”Taxes up, jobs down, legislature ineffective”, according to Jeffries.’450,000 jobs lost this year at an average $68,000 per, 150,000 jobs created at an average of $52,000 per – not good’ according to Nestande.

Jeffries also pointed out that the party in power, regardless of which party, has shown they will do darn near anything to perpetuate that power. There was some disagreement as to whether term limits have been effective at making our state more governable but all agreed that term limits have resulted in shifting power from the people who should be accountable, (our legislators), to people who are not accountable, (staff and lobbyists). The people who make the decisions aren’t around long enough to have to deal with the consequences of their actions so what’s their motivation to work for the long-term good? (Please keep in mind that all legislators are not altruistic by nature. Some just love the power, some just love the perks, and some just want to have a lobbyist mistress who wears a thong).

Agreeing that reform must occur if California is to turn itself around in any meaningful and sustainable way, they admit that if the legislature is not prepared to reform itself then the public will have to do it for them. When asked about the prospect of that occurring through Constitutional Convention, Jeffries voiced some concern about what could result from opening that can of worms while Nestande opined that any result probably couldn’t be much worse than the status quo.

Depressed yet? You shouldn’t be. This is California politics at its best. The more you know, the better prepared you are to deal with it. If you’re not at the table, you’ll surely be on the menu. Sometimes you might be anyway. Of course that’s just my opinion, I could be wrong.

Like maybe a Democrat voting FOR off-shore drilling?

If the Republicans had been able to pull this off, we still wouldn’t know which members voted FOR taxes last budget go-round.

Is it any wonder most people don’t trust politicians as far as they can hurl them.

The following news story appeared in the Los Angeles Times on August 6, 2009:

California Assembly expunges votes on oil drilling bill

By Patrick McGreevy Reporting from Sacramento — Although 28 members of the California Assembly supported a measure to allow new oil drilling off the Santa
Barbara coast, their votes are nowhere to be found in the official state database.

After the measure failed, Assembly leaders expunged the vote altogether, sparing lawmakers running for reelection an official record of
their controversial decision. The voting logs made available to the public on the Legislature’s website do not indicate who voted for and against the
controversial bill on July 24. One critic calls it ‘a legislative coverup.’

It wasn’t the first time the Assembly has done this. The little-known practice of purging votes, which experts say serves little purpose
other than to allow lawmakers to hide actions from the public, is quite common in the lower house, legislative records show. In the last six years, 71
votes on bills in the Assembly have been cleansed from the record.

“The message to the public is ‘this vote was an inconvenient vote and we would rather you not look at the man behind the curtain,’ “said Assemblyman Chuck DeVore (R-Irvine), who wrote the oil drilling bill.

Read the rest of this story at:

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-purge6-2009aug06,0,1598055.story

Anyway, Brian has been a political operative in the area for quite some time. The scion of an old-time California political family, he started his career working in DC for Sonny Bono, stayed on as Mary Bono’s chief of staff and then founded his own advocacy firm before running successfully for office last fall. I first met him back in about 2000 in Bono’s office during NAR hill visits.

Brian opened up with some remarks about the budget process that has frozen our state government since last June. While not naming a date certain, he is confident a compromise will be reached soon. He is equally certain we probably won’t like it and maybe won’t like him when the dust settles. Reason being that ‘everything’ is on the table.

Republicans have stepped up and put as much as $12 – $15 Billion in revenue projects on the table (read: increased taxes). Yeah, that’ll go over well.

And since it is Sacramento, they have already allocated another $12 Billion that is rumored to be in the federal stimulus package for state bail-outs. Yeah, that’s right. They’re balancing our budget with money rumored to be in a plan that may or may not even happen but up to 25% of out projected $42 Billion deficit is riding on that rumor. Is there still any question on the management ethic that lead to our current mess?

Now the only piece of the puzzle missing seems to be Democrats standing up to their union owners and making some meaningful and long-term cuts. Another $12 – $15 Billion of them. That means telling your handlers at the Teachers Union and the Prison Guards Union and the State Employees Union – hey, you’ve sucked us dry. The state is bankrupt. There is no more.

The only problem with that is the unions have promised to target any Democrat who gets out of line on this. Republicans have promised to do the same but we have so few Republican legislators to begin with we can’t really afford to try to kick any of them out.

But enough about that. The highlight of the day was our featured speaker Ed Rollins. Ed is an old time California Pol who worked the hustings 30 – 40 years ago ultimately befriending our one-time governor, a gentleman by the name of Ronald Reagan. The timing was appropriate since today is Ronnie’s birthday and it seemed an auspicious time for Rollins to be making some remarks comparing political realities then and now.

He was quick to give Obama credit for running a finely tuned and extremely effective campaign. He also lauded his charisma and the sense of hope he inspires in people, comparing that in some ways to the effect Reagan had on people. Coming on the heels of several lackluster Presidents, Reagan made the most of his opportunity to right the economy, reinvigorate our military, reestablish our position on the world stage and focus on minimizing the incursions of government into everyday life.

Obama has that same opportunity, coming on the heels of several lackluster Presidents, to right the economy, reestablish our position on the world stage but his main concern with Obama is his propensity to maximize the reach of government into every facet of our system and to saddle us, our children and grandchildren with the bill. He questioned the philosophy that more deficit spending will dig us out of the hole caused by too much deficit spending to begin with. He was also quick to criticize the current stimulus package claiming he is one of  only a handful of Washington insiders who have actually read the document cover to cover. He posited that 95% of our legislators had not.

He portrayed the stimulus package as having many good aspects but on the whole characterizing it as a Democrats spending wet dream. He said Pelosi and Reid went through the drawers and drug out every spending bill that had failed over the last decade and loaded them all into the stimulus – citing several specifics. However, he cautioned that the bill is very likely to pass given the current climate of crisis so we’d better all hope and lobby our representatives to eliminate as much of the waste as possible while retaining those elements that will have a genuine stimulus on the economy.

He discussed two specific problems with the bill – one being that as much as 50% of the money must be spent within 30 days of passage to maximize the impact to the economy. He questioned the ability of any one person, committee or legislative body to figure out how to effectively get as much as $400 Billion spent in 30 days. That’s a recipes for waste, fraud and disaster. But the flip side of that problem is that much of the money will not get spent for as much as 18 – 24 months, which hardly exerts any stimulus on todays economy.

He closed with a story about a discussion he had with Reagan just after his re-election with his popularity at its peak, especially among young people, despite Reagan’s age. When he told Reagan that history would be very kind to him. Reagan responded that he didn’t care how history treated him, just so history treated our young country and it’s citizens well as a result of some of the things he was able to do.

We could use a little of that humility and sense of responsibility right about now. Happy Birthday President Reagan.