The Press-Enterprise

Status Quo of Health Care Can't Last, Sen. Boxer Says | Press-Enterprise

Cecille Isidro — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 20:48:00 -0400

She cited figures from a New America Foundation study indicating that, in California, employer-based family insurance plans will cost $25682 in 2016, ... and more »

Budget Math Flunks | The Press-Enterprise

Cecille Isidro — Tue, 19 May 2009 11:41:00 -0400

Joe Mathews, a senior fellow at the New America Foundation, a nonpartisan think tank, called Tuesday's results a political "wipeout" for the governor. Original article

Joel Kotkin on Ontario's Growth in The Press-Enterprise

Communications — Mon, 23 Oct 2006 18:19:00 -0400

In the increasingly popular move of making urban living part of the Inland landscape, Ontario is upping the stakes.

Construction has started on the city's bid for a slice of big-city life, called Piemonte at Ontario Center, where stores and restaurants are planned to go alongside -- and under -- condominiums. Panattoni Development also expects to put up several office buildings and a 256-room hotel, all of it centered around what no other Inland city has: An 11,000-seat arena.

Piemonte, as planned, would further cement Ontario's status as a regional hub, adding a walkable, insta-neighborhood to a suburban city working through a long list of ambitious projects. While other projects around the region also are installing shops with condos and offices, none is expected to have as many so close to where people shop and eat...

If an urban district will work anywhere in the Inland area, it's Ontario, said economist Joel Kotkin.

"Ontario, unlike most of the other areas in the Inland Empire, is not just dense, but it's an employment center..."

For the complete article, please visit The Press Enterprise website.

Declining to State

Cecille Isidro — Sun, 09 Apr 2006 00:00:00 -0400

Is it time to place the two major political parties on California's endangered species list? If current trends persist, the number of independent voters may outnumber Democrats and Republicans by 2025.

Distrust of elected leaders and faltering confidence in the political establishment have increasingly driven Californians to the no-party label. New voters appear to be moving to the independent status so fast that we need to rethink the red and blue political map in the 2006 California election.

The state's population growth has added 2.4 million citizens to the voter rolls since 1990. Meanwhile, the percentage of registered Democrats declined from 49.9 percent to 42.7 percent, while the Republican share dropped from 39 percent to 34.7 percent.

During the same period, minor-party membership grew from 2.2 percent to 4.4 percent. But the biggest change in the past 16 years was a doubling of "decline to state" or independent voters from 8.9 percent to 18.2 percent.

Moreover, the move away from the major parties has been accelerating. In 1998, there were 1.8 million independents among the state's 14.6 million registered voters. Today, there are 1 million more registered independents than eight years ago, totaling 2.9 million of the 15.8 million voters signed up for the 2006 state election.

Eight counties have at least 20 percent of voters who are registered as independents. At this rate, a voter group that has no organized efforts to sign up new voters is on track to surpass the two major parties in numbers.

So, who are these independents, and what do they stand for? Based on thousands of interviews as part of the Public Policy Institute of California statewide surveys since 1998, independents are younger and better educated than major-party voters. Also, a higher proportion of Latinos and Asians, compared with whites and blacks, are registering as independents.

The data indicate that independents are newly registering voters (young adults, recent residents and immigrants), a trend that bodes well for the growth of independents in a state expected to add 8 million to 10 million residents in the next 20 years.

As for their political leanings, independents mostly describe themselves as middle of the road, while majorities of Democrats opt for the liberal tag and majorities of Republicans choose the conservative label.

In our March survey, 40 percent of independents said they are closest to Democrats, while 24 percent said they are closest to Republicans. However, 36 percent report not being close to either major party

Our polls indicate that independents share a deep distrust of government and dissatisfaction with the political system. In our March survey, nearly half of independents said that most members of Congress are corrupt.

Although majorities of Democrats and Republicans in our September 2004 poll said the two-party system did an adequate job of representing the people, six in 10 independents supported the need for a third party.

In today's changing political environment, campaigns must move beyond the partisan red and blue approach and reach out to the growing nonpartisan or purple vote. As the state's change agents, independents will be looking for ways to end the partisan gridlock they see as ill-suited to the state's challenges in the 21st century.

* * * * *

2006 voters: Since 1990, the percentage of California voters registered as 'decline to state' has more than doubled.

Democrat: 42.7%
Republican: 34.7%
Decline to State: 18.2%
Other: 4.4%

Source: California Secretary of State's Office

Let Citizens Guide Electoral Reform

Cecille Isidro — Thu, 09 Feb 2006 03:00:00 -0500

A year ago in January, Gov. Schwarzenegger declared 2005 "The Year of Reform," kicking off a contentious special election that ended with voters rejecting all of his proposed measures.

California's representative democracy is broken, and serious electoral reforms are needed. The best solution is reforming our electoral process to improve our chances of electing leaders who understand our problems and are committed to solving them.

We suggest convening a Citizens Assembly of randomly selected citizens who care about their government and have no connection to the existing political establishment.

We believe that thoughtful, average folks, given the facts about California's political problems and examples from other electoral systems, will propose common-sense solutions for voters to approve or reject in 2008.

A Citizens Assembly may want to change the way campaigns are funded, modify or eliminate term limits, change the way legislative or congressional districts are drawn, eliminate the Board of Equalization, establish a unicameral Legislature--or perhaps none of these things. The Citizens Assembly would make the recommendations after months of study, a series of public hearings and reasonable compromises.

The Citizens Assembly would adopt a ballot measure or measures and submit them to the Legislature for review. Any legislative changes would have to be approved by the Citizens Assembly, a step designed to maintain the integrity and independence of their work. Ultimately, voters would have the final say on the proposed reforms.

Does such a process sound far-fetched? Our neighbors to the north in British Columbia used just such a process in 2004 to propose changes to their electoral system. A robust 58 percent of voters supported the measure, though 60 percent was needed for passage. The proposal is back on the ballot for 2008.

Inspired by this example, we have drafted legislation to establish a California Citizens Assembly, fund its operations and place its recommendations on the ballot for voter approval.

After this year's failed special election, it is time for a Year of Citizens Reform.

Ensuring Ballot Integrity

Cecille Isidro — Sun, 06 Nov 2005 00:00:00 -0500

Last month's report of the Commission on Federal Election Reform headed by former President Jimmy Carter and former Secretary of State James Baker deserves serious attention. The commission makes recommendations that would greatly improve our elections. The commission's boldest call is for universal voter registration, a practice used by many democracies around the world in which all eligible voters are automatically registered to vote. Universal registration would add more than 50 million unregistered Americans--nearly three in 10 eligible voters, disproportionately young and low-income--to our voter rolls.

But the devil is in the details, and the commission fails to lay out a clear plan for how to ensure that all eligible voters are registered and it shies away from a national system. But if implemented fully, universal voter registration would be one of the single most important government civil-rights actions since the 1965 Voting Rights Act.

Other commission recommendations respond directly to problems in our recent elections worth noting.

In the wake of presidential races in which secretaries of state in Florida and Ohio made controversial decisions affecting tightly fought national races, the commission calls for using nonpartisan election officials. This would help rid our elections of the appearance of political bias and might dissuade actual fraud.

Heeding a rising tide of activism in some states founded on mistrust of the privately owned voting equipment companies that supply elections, the commission calls for a paper audit trail that can be verified by each voter.

Challenging the majority view of the National Association of Secretaries of State that voted in February to restore what essentially amounted to the pre-2000 decentralized regime for administering elections, commissioners call for ongoing federal election funding and a strong Election Assistance Commission.

The commission supports overhauling the presidential primary schedule. The current system is absolutely bankrupt, with states chaotically advancing their primaries in the hope of gaining candidate attention--but collectively making it even more likely that Iowa and New Hampshire will be the only states that matter.

True, most of these proposals won't transform politics. In addition, as part of a trade-off to secure bipartisan support for policies designed to increase voter rolls, the report recommends problematic measures to prevent vote fraud.

Absentee voters need only sign their ballot to prove validity, for example, while voters at the polls would have to present a photo ID. And although the commission recommends that IDs be free, states may seek to charge fees and other practical barriers that would be tantamount to a poll tax--as a federal court recently found Georgia did with its new voter ID law.

The commission in general falls short by failing to establish a national system. There is no doubt that some states will abuse these recommendations, jumping to require photo IDs while not registering all eligible voters.

But Americans are increasingly fed up with both major parties, and efforts to block reasonable steps toward free and fair elections could be political folly.

Supreme Limits

Cecille Isidro — Sun, 11 Sep 2005 02:00:00 -0400

The U.S. Senate will soon begin confirmation hearings for Supreme Court nominee John Roberts. With partisan groups on both sides gearing up for a fight, the process promises to be as contentious as past confirmations.

One can't help but wonder if we couldn't avoid much of the partisan mud wrestling about Supreme Court nominees if there were term limits on the high court. Perhaps more than any single factor, the "until death do we part" constitutional requirement has been responsible for bruising confirmation battles.

At age 50, Roberts could serve for decades on the court if he's confirmed.

Other democracies employ judicial term limits, so this is not an unusual practice. High court justices in Germany are limited to a 12-year term and in France, Italy and Spain, the limit is nine years.

There's American precedent for judicial term limits, with judges on the U.S. Court of Federal Claims limited to 15-year terms. Also, members of the Federal Reserve Board, shielded from politics since they oversee the nation's economy, serve 14-year terms, with the chairman appointed to a four-year term.

Another possibility is a mandatory retirement age. Australia and Israel retire their judges at age 70 and in Canada judges are retired at age 75. A few U.S. states have mandatory retirement ages for judges. In Minnesota and Missouri, it's age 70. If this standard were applied to the current Supreme Court, two justices would have retired already, with two more stepping down next year.

Interestingly, for most of American history, Supreme Court justices averaged about 13 years in service because appointees to the court used to be much older. But according to Northwestern University law professors Steven Calabresi and James Lindgren, the average term for Supreme Court justices doubled to about 26 years between 1989 and 2000.

The late Chief Justice William Rehnquist served on the high court for 33 years. John Paul Stevens, the oldest member of the court at 85, has served 29 years.

Traditionally, appointees were distinguished elders whose appointment was considered a capstone to a career in public service. For example, William Howard Taft, after serving as president and a cabinet secretary, was appointed to be chief justice at the age of 64. Now, presidents look for some young buck with no paper trail who can be installed for decades.

Beyond judicial term limits and a mandatory retirement age, it's also worth considering multiple appointing authorities. In France and Germany, no single person or institution has a monopoly on appointments to the constitutional court. In Spain, four judges are appointed by the upper house, four by the lower house, two by the government and two by a judges council.

Bipartisan appointments also hold promise. The Senate might review only nominees proposed through a bipartisan selection procedure. As a step in that direction, one option is to require a confirmation vote of 60 senators instead of a simple majority. Since no one party usually would have that many votes, it would nudge the parties toward bipartisan consensus.

According to Professor Matthew Shugart at the University of California, San Diego, for the past three election cycles, more than 200 million votes were cast in races that elected the nation's 100 senators.

Republicans won 46.8 percent of the votes in these elections--but the Democrats won more votes, 48.4 percent. Yet the GOP currently holds a lopsided 55-to-44-seat majority. So the minority party holds a majority of Senate seats.

A body as unrepresentative as the U.S. Senate should not confirm lifetime appointments, especially by simple majority vote. Defenders of the status quo undoubtedly will view any tampering as an assault on judicial independence. But the bitter partisanship of the current process has deeply undercut all notions of justice and fairness.

Judicial term limits, mandatory retirement ages, higher confirmation thresholds and multiple appointing/confirming authorities would help to decrease politicization, create a modest amount of turnover and ensure that one party doesn't monopolize the process.

In these times of extreme partisan polarization, that would be good for America.

Instant Runoff Voting Aids "Majority Rule"

Cecille Isidro — Mon, 11 Jul 2005 00:00:00 -0400

"Majority rule" is one of the cornerstones of our representative democracy. Unless a candidate wins a majority of the vote, we cannot be certain that the winner is the one preferred by the most voters.

Yet, too often, American elections fail this most basic test of democracy.

In three of our last four presidential elections, the winning candidate did not have a majority of the national popular vote.

In the Inland Empire, candidates with less than a popular majority have won important races. In recent years, such winners have included the mayors of Barstow, Fontana and Rialto, a member of the Board of Supervisors in San Bernardino County, as well as winners of seats on various school boards, utility agencies and community service districts.

Fortunately, there are better methods that guarantee the election of winners with support from a majority of voters.

One option is to hold a second, runoff election between the top two finishers to determine the majority winner.

Some elections in the Inland Empire have employed that option, including races for five seats on the Riverside City Council, the Riverside County Board of Supervisors, and San Bernardino County's auditor and district attorney. Runoff races, however, can be expensive. Riverside's City Council races required a second, stand-alone election in January, and taxpayers had to foot the bill.

Better than a two-round runoff election is a method known as instant runoff voting (IRV) because it elects majority winners in a single election, saving both time and taxes. Here's how it works:

Voters rank candidates in order of preference: a first ranking for your favorite candidate, a second ranking for your next-favorite, and so on. A candidate who wins a majority of first ranking wins the race. If not, the "instant runoff" begins.

The candidate with the least votes is eliminated. Ballots for the eliminated candidate are immediately canvassed for the voter's second-ranked candidate -- the one you'd support if forced to come back to the polls. Ballots are recounted and, if a candidate has a majority, he or she wins. If not, the process is repeated until one candidate has majority support.

In last November's election, San Francisco used IRV for the first time in local races. Two exit polls showed that voters liked the new system and found it easy to use. San Francisco's experience also shows that IRV offers something to those tired of polarized politics and mudslinging campaigns -- it discourages negative campaigning.

That's because winners may need to attract the second or third rankings from the supporters of rival candidates. The incentive is to find common ground and build coalitions with other candidates, rather than tearing one another down.

San Francisco saw a noticeable rise in positive campaigning and coalition-building in several races, prompting a New York Times article headlined: "New Runoff System in San Francisco Has the Rival Candidates Cooperating."

Using IRV, Inland Empire voters could guarantee majority winners in a single election, saving time and taxes. Instant runoff voting is a model of efficiency and cost savings, and that should be a welcome change, not only in the Inland Empire but everywhere.