California: How Process Creates Crisis
California is the nation's largest state, and is often seen as a bellweather for economic and social change. However, the peculiar dynamic of state government institutions has threatened that role, as the state has slipped into an almost perpetual crisis mode. Despite an overwhelming majority of progressive lawmakers in the state legislature, the two-thirds rule for passing a budget and tax increases, among other issues, handcuffs them and empowers a radical conservative minority. Thirty years of short-term fixes and failed leadership have only exacerbated the problem and put the state—and the nation—in real danger. As Paul Krugman recently said, "Years of neglect, followed by economic disaster—and with all reasonable responses blocked by a fanatical, irrational minority ... This could be America next." In this session, we will look at the reasons for California's budget tangle, the larger implications for the progressive movement at large, and what some organizations are doing to change these outdated rules and take back state government for the people.
David Dayen has been blogging on state and national issues since 2004. He writes on his own site D-Day, as well as at Digby's Hullabaloo and the California progressive political site Calitics. He is a past delegate to the California Democratic Party and has worked with California progressive groups like the ACLU, Unite-Here and the Courage Campaign. His work has appeared in the LA Times, the Washington Post and Capitol Weekly.
Robert Cruickshank is the Public Policy Director at the Courage Campaign, where he leads projects on reforming California's broken government. He's also a longtime netroots activist - after starting on Daily Kos in 2003, he has been writing at Calitics since its inception in 2005, and founded the California High Speed Rail Blog in 2008. A native Californian, he was trained as a historian at the University of Washington, specializing in the study of California in the 20th century. He currently lives in Monterey.
Jean M. Ross is the founding executive director of the CBP. Her professional experience includes serving as principal consultant to the Assembly Revenue and Taxation Committee; senior consultant to the Assembly Human Services Committee, where she staffed the California Legislature's Joint Select Committee on the Changing Family; and assistant research director of the SEIU where she was responsible for coordinating research on tax, budget, and employment policy issues. Ms. Ross serves on the Board of the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy, the Advisory Committee of California's Franchise Tax Board, and the Board of the California Tax Reform Association.
