Capitol Alert

The campaign against Gov. Jerry Brown's November ballot initiative to raise taxes released an online-only ad today criticizing Brown and the Legislature for their approval of California's high-speed rail project and for the recent state parks scandal, suggesting the state does not take care of the money it has.

The argument, set in the ad to the Go Go's hit song "Vacation," is the standard one made by opponents of Proposition 30, which would raise the state sales tax and income taxes on California's highest earners.

The No on 30 campaign has had little money so far to get its message out, reporting raising just $10,000 in the first half of the year. The campaign announced today that it had received a $100,000 donation from John Cox, a businessman and former Chicago-area Republican official who ran for president in 2008 before abandoning his long-shot candidacy.

Cox said today on the Fox & Hounds Daily blog that he recently moved to California.

Assembly Speaker John A. Pérez announced a spate of leadership and policy committee changes Wednesday, less than a month before the Legislature adjourns its regular session for the year.

Mike Gatto, D-Los Angeles, will assume the chairmanship of the powerful Assembly Appropriations Committee beginning Friday, shortly before the panel decides the fate of scores of Senate bills.

Other key changes in committee chairmanships, all involving Democrats, include these:

• Joan Buchanan of Alamo taking control of the Education Committee;
• Das Williams of Santa Barbara, Higher Education;
• Felipe Fuentes of Los Angeles, Revenue and Taxation;
• Bob Wieckowski of Fremont, Judiciary;
• Rich Gordon of Menlo Park, Business, Professions and Consumer Protection;
• Michael Allen of Santa Rosa, Public Employees, Retirement and Social Security;
• and Ben Hueso of San Diego, Water, Parks and Wildlife Committee.

All changes in Assembly committee chairs will take effect Friday, including two involving Sacramento Democrats: Roger Dickinson will lead the Banking and Finance Committee, while Richard Pan will assume the gavel of the Health Committee.

A joint legislative panel showed unanimous support Wednesday for an independent audit of California's state parks department after revelations that officials there hid nearly $54 million and approved unauthorized vacation buyouts.

The Joint Legislative Audit Committee asked State Auditor Elaine Howle to prioritize the investigation into how the Department of Parks and Recreation hid funds and underreported account balances to the Department of Finance and lawmakers. Howle said she could fast-track the audit to the Legislature by January, the start of the next budget season.

The committee also asked Howle to investigate how parks officials secretly paid out more than $271,000 to 56 employees in exchange for stored vacation time, transactions first reported by The Bee last month. The audit panel initially voted 7-0 on a bipartisan basis for an expedited parks audit, though the tally was not yet final because some members were expected to add their votes later.

Gov. Jerry Brown administration officials said last month that the parks department hid nearly $54 million in two funds. On Friday, his Department of Finance said it discovered $268.5 million of accounting errors in other special funds in a quick two-week review, but that the mistakes were honest unlike the parks situation. The department also said that most of the net $196.7 million in extra funds had been corrected prior to the latest budget enactment in June and are not surplus like the parks money.

Assemblywoman Beth Gaines, R-Rocklin, told the legislative panel that the Department of Finance's recent findings were insufficient and that an independent review from Howle's Bureau of State Audits would inspire more public confidence.

"Californians feel betrayed, and this audit is essential to gaining back their trust," said Gaines, who was among more than a dozen signatories from both parties asking for the review.

The Assembly Budget Committee will question Brown officials for the first time Thursday on the parks situation and the Finance audit showing accounting inconsistencies.

California has the nation's 12th highest average sales tax rate, 8.13 percent, according to a new compilation by the Washington, D.C.-based Tax Foundation.

While four states -- Oregon, Montana, New Hampshire and Delaware -- levy no sales taxes, other states' average rates range to as high as 9.43 percent in Tennessee.

California's basic state sales tax rate is 6.25 percent, and there's another 1 percent levied statewide for local governments. But that 7.25 percent statewide rate swells to near 10 percent in some jurisdictions due to local surtaxes for transportation and other services.

Gov. Jerry Brown's proposed tax increase measure, Proposition 30, would temporarily add a quarter-percent to the state's rate. Several city and county governments have also placed local sales tax hikes on the November ballot.

Editor's note, 4:27 p.m.: This post has been updated to correct the characterization of Proposition 30.

California labor unions and a few employers are pushing for an end-of-session bill that would change the workers compensation system by increasing payments to permanently injured workers and limiting the fees that can be charged in processing claims.

"A group of representatives from labor and management are negotiating a deal to bring better efficiencies and benefit delivery to the workers comp system," said Angie Wei, a lobbyist with the California Labor Federation.

"We're going to find cost savings in the system by establishing fee schedules where they didn't have them before."

The bill is not yet in print, but Wei said she expects one to be introduced shortly. She said her group has been in talks with the chairs of the Senate Labor and Assembly Insurance committees. Unions and employers had been negotiating over the issue for months, Wei said, though just three and a half weeks remain in the legislative session.

California has overhauled its workers compensation system about once a decade for the last 30 years. The last time was in 2004 under then-Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger.

"Injured workers have suffered under the deep cuts in benefits that were never expected and never intended under the Arnold Schwarzenegger reform," she said. "The time is long overdue to rectify the injustice for these injured workers."

Gov. Jerry Brown vetoed several workers comp bills last year, writing messages that wanted to see comprehensive changes to the system, not a piecemeal approach. In vetoing Assembly Bill 947 he wrote:

"Workers compensation reforms ... need to be addressed on a broad and balanced scale -- ensuring workers receive adequate and timely benefits and treatment, while also ensuring that the costs of the system are sustainable."

When Sen. Lois Wolk opened a hearing of her Senate Governance and Finance Committee on Wednesday to consider four major ballot measures dealing with taxes and the state budget, she said she hoped the testimony and the factual data would help voters make rational decisions.

Fat chance.

The hearing on Propositions 30, 31, 38 and 39 was scheduled to be televised by the California Channel, but at the last second, Senate leaders blocked the broadcast. Thus it allowed only the few spectators in the hearing room and those technologically adroit enough to find the Internet audio feed to listen to the mini-debates on the measures.

Why the cutoff?

Perhaps the Senate's Democratic leader, President Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg, didn't want to give opponents of Proposition 30, the sales and income tax hike he strongly supports, air time, especially when they were bound to criticize Steinberg's giving raises to Senate staffers.

Jon Coupal of the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association did, in fact, highlight those Senate raises during his opposition testimony on Proposition 30.

But Rhys Williams, Steinberg's spokesman, said the cutoff wasn't aimed specifically at Coupal and other tax opponents, but at everyone arguing for and against all four measures.

From Matt Weiser:

Republican leaders in the Legislature on Wednesday called for former State Parks director Ruth Coleman and others to testify about financial problems at the agency.

In a letter to Democratic majority leaders, the authors list at least 17 people they want to testify. They specifically name 11, some of whom departed in the wake of the fiscal scandal, including Coleman, her chief deputy Michael Harris, former administrative deputy director Manuel Harris, and chief counsel Ann Malcolm.

The letter was signed by Senate Republican leader Bob Huff of Diamond Bar; Assembly Republican leader Connie Conway of Tulare; Bill Emmerson of Hemet, vice-chair of the Senate Budget & Fiscal Review Committee; and Jim Nielsen of Gerber, vice-chair of the Assembly Budget Committee.

"It is essential that we thoroughly investigate and remedy the special fund budgeting process to prevent such abuses in the future," they wrote.

The letter is meant to guide oversight hearings now being planned by the Legislature to get to the bottom of the scandal, in which it was discovered State Parks had hidden nearly $54 million in two special funds for at least 12 years. Last year, Lopez also carried out an unauthorized vacation buyout program for parks headquarters employees that cost taxpayers more than $270,000.

The four lawmakers also specify that they want leaders to testify from other key agencies, including finance, the controller's office, the attorney general and personnel administration.

Gov. Jerry Brown's proposal to impose a 1 percent lumber tax and limit wildfire liability awards formally surfaced in the Legislature this week amid heavy lobbying from the timber industry.

The wide-ranging forestry package that has drawn mixed reviews from environmentalists was amended Tuesday into Assembly Bill 1492. Environmentalists generally like the fact that money will be raised for regulating the industry but are concerned about other provisions that reduce the frequency of environmental reviews and limit how much landowners will pay if they spark wildfires.

The bill is no slam dunk since it requires a two-thirds vote of the Legislature as a tax. Republicans were opposed to the bill earlier this year, but they are facing new pressure from high-powered lobbyists in the Capitol representing forestry interests. Forest Landowners of California issued an "Action Alert" last week asking its members to specifically call Sen. Ted Gaines, R-Roseville, and Sen. Doug LaMalfa, R-Richvale, who represent large swaths of forest land.

According to the alert, the backing coalition includes forestry groups and the California Farm Bureau Federation. California timber companies say they need the changes to overcome a market disadvantage against competitors in the Pacific Northwest and overseas who now supply most wood sold in the state.

Democratic Rep. Pete Stark apparently didn't take kindly to the news that former state Assemblyman Alberto Torrico has decided to endorse his Democratic opponent in the 15th Congressional District.

Torrico recounted his account of the conversation to the National Journal:

After "calling me a turncoat," Torrico said that Stark "questioned my mental health. He asked me if I was well, if I was ill. He said that he was concerned for the safety of my children, that maybe he should send a social worker to my house to check on their safety because I'm clearly ill." ...

During their conversation, Stark, who is the only openly atheist member of Congress, also questioned Torrico's Christian faith, Torrico said. "He took the opportunity to say he'd come to my house and teach my children about the Christian faith because I couldn't," he said.

"From an atheist, I found it interesting," Torrico added.

Stark later acknowledged in a statement to the National Journal that he "got a little heated," but said Torrico was "itching for a fight.

This isn't the first time bizarre behavior has landed the 80-year-old incumbent in the news this cycle. He said during one debate that challenger Eric Swalwell accepted "hundreds of thousands of dollars in bribes" without providing evidence to back his claim. He also falsely accused San Francisco Chronicle columnist Debra Saunders of contributing to his rival's campaign.

Editor's note: This post was updated at 4:37 p.m. with a comment from Stark.

Assemblywoman Nancy Skinner is crafting legislation that would require law enforcement to be notified by the seller when a customer purchases more than 1,000 rounds of ammunition.

The Berkeley Democrat, who chairs the powerful Assembly Rules Committee, said she was outraged at reports that the suspect in the July shooting of dozens of people at a Colorado movie theater had purchased more than 6,000 rounds of ammunition in a short period of time.

Requiring notification when someone appears to be stockpiling ammunition "gives law enforcement at least the ability to assess whether it's something they should be looking into further," said Skinner, who plans to team with Democratic state Sen. Loni Hancock of Berkeley on the bill.

"We have, sadly, gun violence that plagues a number of our communities," said Skinner, portions of whose Bay Area district overlaps with that of Hancock. "Every effort we can make to try to minimize that gun violence is the better for our communities and for public safety."

Dan Walters talks about a nationally watched case in Southern California in which parents have been fighting to take over an underperforming elementary school.

Have a question you'd like Dan to answer? Post it on our Facebook page.

See other Dan Walters Daily clips here.

VIDEO: Dan Walters, in today's report, talks about a parent "revolution" in a small Southern California town.

Four November ballot measures come under scrutiny this morning as the Senate Governance and Finance Committee hear from supporters and opponents as well as representatives of the Legislative Analyst's Office on their possible effects.

Trudy Schafer of the League of Women Voters of California will be arguing in favor of Gov. Jerry Brown's tax measure, Proposition 30, while Jon Coupal of the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association will argue against it.

California Forward's proposal, Proposition 31, would require more public notice on legislation, two-year budgeting cycles, and identification of revenue or savings to offset a major new spending program or tax cut. Listed speakers include proponent Bill Hauck, the former chairman of the California Constitution Revision Commission, and opponent Lenny Goldberg, executive director of the California Tax Reform Association.

Speaking in favor of civil rights lawyer Molly Munger's tax measure, Proposition 38, is Carol Kocivar, president of the California State PTA, while California Medical Association CEO Dustin Corcoran will argue against it.

Proposition 39, which is hedge fund manager Tom Steyer's tax measure, gets the nod from Sen. Kevin de León, D-Los Angeles, the campaign's honorary co-chairman. Dorothy Rothrock, a lobbyist for the California Manufacturers and Technology Association, argues against it.

That hearing runs from 9:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. in the Capitol's Room 112.

Meanwhile, the Assembly Appropriations Committee will be working through a long list of bills, including Senate Bill 1221 by Sen. Ted Lieu, D-Torrance, which would ban using dogs to hunt bears and bobcats. The agenda also includes Senate Bill 1234, by Sen. Kevin de León, which would set up a state-run pension plan for private-sector workers whose employers don't offer one. The hearing starts at 9 a.m. in the Capitol's Room 4202.

Elsewhere in the lower house, members of the Select Committee on Boys and Men of Color hear from federal official Russlynn Ali, who heads the Office for Civil Rights, about the Obama administration's efforts to promote equity and reform in education. That hearing starts at 1 p.m. in Room 4202.

Click here to read the Senate's daily file, and click here for the Assembly's.

CAPITOL DRIVE: Assemblyman Roger Dickinson, D-Sacramento, has kicked off a second annual back-to-school drive for Sacramento students. Bring new or gently used backpacks, as well as new supplies such as pencils, rulers, notebooks, folders, lined paper and the like to the Capitol's Room 3126, Dickinson's district office at 915 L St. or these businesses in the 1000 block of L Street across from the Capitol: Café Roma, the Café Connection, and Russo Shoe Repair. The collection runs through Aug. 31. Supplies will go to Oak Ridge Elementary School in the Oak Park neighborhood.