Sum of the Senate

When the Drudge Report published its shocking headline in January that more than 700 new laws were set to take effect in California, those who actually watch Sacramento just shrugged. That’s not an unusual, or even particularly high, number for our bill-happy Legislature. In fact, common sense would indicate that, with a Democratic legislature and a Democratic governor, we’re looking at even more bills from this session going into law.

Here’s another misconception: Bills are fiercely partisan. That’s not true at all; scanning through the legislative bits sponsored by San Diego’s state Senate delegation shows a lot of unanimous support for some reforms. And, of course, there are divisive bills as well as bills that seem totally carved with a specific special interest in mind.

Our four-member delegation is half Republican, half Democrat with the latter holding key chair positions. Three of them are either seeking or are likely to seek other offices soon, and the makeup of their districts may change significantly when the California Redistricting Commission finishes its task.

Here’s our breakdown of what’s transpired in the Senate since our last legislative round up in February:

Joel Anderson, Republican, District 36

Clout quotient: 17.4 percent of his 23 bills have passed out of the Senate, all with almost unanimous support from both sides of the aisle. The senator from El Cajon told us in January that his top priority was passing a bill allowing taxpayers holding state IOUs to use those “registered warrants” to pay for other state fees. That, too, has made it out of the Senate.

One of his biggest victories was announced in May when CalPERS, the largest public-employee-pension system in the world, finally agreed to sell all holdings in companies operating in Sudan and Iran. As CityBeat reported, CalPERS had completely avoided divestment (Anderson passed the anti-Iran law while an Assembly member) by crafting blanket policies that arguably ignored the Legislature’s intent. Anderson not only grilled CalPERS, and its teachers’ pension counterpart, CalSTRS, in committee, but he also moved a bill out of the Senate requiring CalPERS to make divestment decisions in open, public meetings.

One of Anderson’s noblest goals is pressuring Gov.

Jerry Brown to hold a town-hall meeting in El Cajon; he filmed himself marching in to deliver an invitation and plans a second visit once he’s collected letters from constituents.

Fundraising: Anderson hasn’t yet filed a fundraising statement for 2011, but in May, he did file a disclosure of his fundraising efforts from the third quarter of 2010: $67,600, virtually all from business interests, especially the healthcare industry.

Mark Wyland, Republican, District 38

Clout Quotient: 16.6 percent of Wyland’s 30 bills have made it out of the Senate, including two that further regulate licensed professional clinical counselors and introduce new fees for the professionals (something we’ll remember if Wyland ever makes the claim he never voted to raise taxes). Wyland narrowly lost a battle in committee over a bill supported by law-enforcement groups and opposed by defense attorneys and the ACLU that would have required those convicted of animal cruelty, prostitution, peeping or secretly filming people changing

clothes to submit DNA samples to a statewide database.

In February, Wyland’s office told us he was most focused on a trio of constitutional reforms. One would require the state auditor to evaluate every state program, another would split the legislative cycle so that the budget is written every other year, and the third would make budget bills public three weeks before a floor vote. None have received a hearing; nor has Izaiah’s Law, his proposal to allow juvenile drunken drivers to be tried as adults.

Fundraising: Wyland has formed a committee to run for the state Board of Equalization in 2014 and has so far raised $16,000 from two organizations: the Sycuan Band of the Kumeyaay Nation and the California Ambulatory Surgery Association. He’s also loaned himself $5,000, which still puts him way behind Assemblymember Diane Harkey, who gave herself $100,000 for her BOE campaign.

Christine Kehoe, Democrat, District 39

Clout Quotient: 74 percent of Kehoe’s 27 bills have passed the Senate, which probably has a lot to do with the fact that she controls the Senate Appropriations Committee and is one of the Senate’s top gatekeepers.

Although Kehoe’s work on the sale of the Del Mar fairgrounds and the expansion of Interstate 5 have taken center stage, she’s been pushing a diverse and often-controversial agenda. As head of the LGBT Caucus, Kehoe has passed bills in the Senate to ban state agencies from contracting with companies that don’t provide benefits to same-sex couples and require doctors, nurses and mental-health professionals to take at least one continuing-education class in LGBT care. On the environmental front, the Senate passed a Kehoe bill supported by San Diego Coastkeeper and the Port of San Diego that would phase out the use of boat paint containing copper; on the other hand, Kehoe is one of the few local voices opposing legislation that would block the Gregory Canyon landfill. As for political reform, she ushered through the Senate a bill requiring government employees to file personal financial disclosures and another that would allow apartment renters to display whatever political signs they want. However, she’s gained little traction so far on a bill that would test an all-mail ballot election in San Diego County.

Kehoe garnered universal support from her colleagues on a bill supported by local governments and law-enforcement groups that would create a family-justice-court pilot program in San Diego, Alameda and Anaheim counties. The bill is, however, opposed by a wide variety of advocates for domestic-violence victims, particularly those working with marginalized ethnic groups. The ACLU and the Privacy Rights Clearinghouse are also currently against the bill (“unless amended”), though the Clearinghouse says it may go neutral if Brown commits to saving the Office of Privacy Protection from elimination. Another domestic-violence bill, focusing on strangulation, seems to have been amended so that it doesn’t cause problems for bondage and sado-masochism enthusiasts (the subject of a March 2 CityBeat report).

Political watchdogs blame Kehoe for being one of the leading senators who killed a bill that would’ve banned the practice of lobbyists or their employers giving gifts to legislators. According to the Sacramento Bee’s database of gifts, Kehoe has received 96 gifts worth more than $3,400 since entering the Legislature, and that doesn’t count anything she’s received since January.

Fundraising: Kehoe hasn’t reported her fundraising for 2011 yet. Recently, she took out a $50,000 loan against her house, re-launched her website and then announced she’s exploring a run for mayor. The first report in that race will cover all of June and indicate what kind of support she has locally.


Juan Vargas, Democrat, District 40 ‘

Clout Quotient: 50 percent of his 20 bills have passed the Senate, and one of them—a bill to allow Imperial County to have a registrar of voters manage elections instead of the county clerk—has already become law.
He’s supported the unions with his measure to hamper the proliferation of big-box superstores as well as a bill to require greater disclosure of subcontract details when government agencies privatize operations—both have passed out of the Senate. Taking a shot at local Republicans, the Senate also passed his bill to prevent parties from including endorsement letters in sample-ballot mailings (San Diego County Republican Party Chairman Tony Krvaric scored a major coup in 2010 when he invoked an almost-forgotten law allowing the letters). Vargas’ bill to block the Gregory Canyon landfill gained a lot of attention because he previously supported the project and had to fight against Kehoe to pass it through the Senate.

Fundraising: Through two committees, Vargas has raised $40,500 from special interests (not a penny from an individual), including healthcare professionals, unions and the mortgage industry. Congressmember Bob Filner is expected to announce his candidacy for mayor of San Diego any day; most political observers are predicting Vargas will immediately file to succeed him.    


Write to davem@sdcitybeat.com and editor@sdcitybeat.com.