When CA politicians ignore the risks of policy, failure often follows

From And WaltersCalmness

This comment was originally published by CalmattersS Register about their ballots.

Governors and legislators of California have a very bad habit of applying large programs and projects without fully examining their risk risks.

The most spectacular example happened in 1996, when Republican governor Pete Wilson and Democrats-controlled legislation decided to revise the electricity industry in California.

The legislation was struck in the long and secret negotiations that participants called “March of the Death of Steve Peace” as a state senator who destroyed efforts. He had only come into force with a cursory public contribution.

As the 2003 autopsy of the resulting disaster was chronic, “the act was welcomed as a historical reform that would reward consumers with lower prices, strengthen the then California economy, and provided a model for other countries. Six years later, the reforms were lied to the races of the intersection of the stations and the rates of the races of the rates and the stations wholesale.

Other examples of a bad habit abound as a start Building a bullet train Connecting the two halves of the state with only rudimentary assumptions about its expenses, riding and other important factors – a project that limbs almost two decades later.

The other two are extremely many Dear expansion of retirement benefits for public officials A few decades ago that rammed the budgets of local self -government and Large increases in unemployment benefits Without increasing revenue, which has led to a $ 20 billion debt to the federal government, which is still increasing.

This leads us to Senate Bill 769Which seems superficial is a positive effort to expand infrastructure financing, but it may be another example of unforeseen consequences. The measure introduced by Sen. Anna CabalaleroMerced Democrat, will create the Infrastructure Corporation Golden State, a state -owned non -profit company that can borrow money or issue bonds and provide funding for public or private infrastructure projects.

State cashier Fiona Ma is the sponsor of the bill and will appoint the best executive director of the corporation, which will meet the five-member council of the selected employees and appointed by the governors.

“Through partnerships of public and private capital, the SB 769 enables critical investment in climate resilience, water systems, energy infrastructure, housing and transport, job creation and the reference of the future in California for the next generations,” said Cabalero’s office.

“California cannot afford to wait for Washington or for outdated funding systems to catch up with the 21st century needs,” she said in a statement. “The SB 769 is for the construction of a sustainable, modern California, creating a more intelligent, fascinating way of financing the infrastructure that protects our communities, creates good jobs and prepares us for upcoming challenges.”

There are aspects of the proposal that should activate alarm bells.

There is no limit to how much debt the corporation can take over. The state will also not be responsible if its financial structure collapses. Private project financing decisions can be made secretly as the corporation will be released from some open meetings and open records.

The danger here is that with a potentially unlimited sum of money that must be distributed without public contribution, the political figures of the Corporate Council may be swinging to play favorites for reasons excluded from improving infrastructure.

We’ve seen scandals of this species elsewhere in government, such as in Decisions to use land on the coastal committee and California Public Employment Pension System InvestmentsS

Without better precautionary measures and more sun, this is another scandal that is waiting for it to happen.

This article was Originally Published on CalMatters and was reissued under Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Noderivatives License.