David Lesher

Exporting California

Communications — Fri, 23 Mar 2007 08:00:00 -0400

A New America Event
03/22/2007 - 9:00am

California, the most diverse and entrepreneurial state in America, is poised for a big step onto the national stage this year. Its presidential primary is moving to the front end of the 2008 campaign season. Its native daughter, Nancy Pelosi, is serving her historic first year as Speaker of the House. And the nation is taking notice as a series of major bipartisan policy agreements take place in Sacramento.

Within this context the New America Foundation, with co-hosts Public Policy Institute of California and The James Irvine Foundation held this important event to delve into what makes California unique in the national political landscape. The purpose of the series is to identify important themes for the upcoming year and to provide a platform for high-level discussion by major policy leaders about the most important issues facing our state.

Governor Schwarzenegger keynoted a program that included key elected oficials, along with noted national and California-based journalists. Two influential online news sources covered the event: the California Progress Report and San Francisco-based KQED's Capitol Notes .

To view a webcast or read a transcript of the Governor's remarks, please visit the Governor's website.

David Lesher Discusses Kids' Accounts on Sacramento's KXTV

Communications — Fri, 02 Mar 2007 21:15:00 -0500

New America in the News:

California lawmakers are considering giving $500 to every single baby born in the state. The bipartisan bill aims to give babies a financial head start with a savings account.

"Anything we can do to encourage savings and investment and to provide a young adult -- especially young adults from lower income families, families of modest means -- to be able to have a small nest egg to go to college to learn a career, down payment on the house, would be a good thing," said Sen. Darrell Steinberg, D-Sacramento.

At age 18, each child would repay the original $500 gift, but they can keep any interest and additional deposits tax free.

"We're at a point where our middle class needs to grow," said David Lesher from the New America Foundation, a group that invests in non-traditional policy ideas. "We have an income gap with too many rich, too many poor and we don't have enough in the middle class..."

For the complete story, please visit the KXTV, Sacramento website.

David Lesher on San Francisco's KGO-TV Explaining Kids' Savings Accounts Bill

Communications — Fri, 02 Mar 2007 03:47:00 -0500

New America in the News:

Mar. 1 - KGO - A new plan to give newborns a head start is getting mixed reviews. The idea is to give every baby born in California $500 dollars. It would be a nest egg they would have money out of taxpayers pockets today -- that would be a nest egg when those babies become young adults...

After families add money, at 18 the child would have to pay the state back $500 and use what's left tax free for college, a house, or a retirement account. The idea came from the New America Foundation, a non partisan think tank which found one Democrat and one Republican to introduce the bill.

David Lesher, New America Foundation: "I don't know how we can not afford to give people access to home ownership and college -- that they might not otherwise have..."

New mom Lisa Jenkins would rather see the state put to use the $500 now, rather than having little Sophie wait until she's 18 to see any benefits.

Lisa Jenkins, New mother: "There's going to be a need for more classrooms, more teachers, or overcrowding of what we already have."

But the New America Foundation says we have to give these little ones a chance.

David Lesher: "We're at a point where our middle class needs to grow. We have an income gap, with too many rich and too many poor -- and not enough in the middle class."

For the complete story, please visit the KGO-TV, San Francisco website.

San Francisco Chronicle Reports on Kids Savings Account Bill

Communications — Thu, 01 Mar 2007 20:28:00 -0500

New America in the News:

SACRAMENTO, Calif. — Every child born in California would get a $500 savings account to start building a nest egg for college or a down payment for a home, under a state Senate bill introduced Wednesday.

California would be the first state with such a program, said David Lesher, a program director for the nonprofit New America Foundation, based in Washington. A national savings program has languished in Congress since 2005; a similar program has increased savings in Britain since 2002.

Under the bill, every child born in California after Jan. 1, 2008, would receive the money, regardless of their parents' income or immigration status. Recipients would have to repay the state's initial $500 investment once the turn 18.

The money may be used for three purposes: college or continuing education, a down payment on a home, or a retirement account.

For the complete article, please visit the San Francisco Chronicle website.

To read the proposal, please click here.

David Lesher on California Independents in San Francisco Chronicle

Communications — Mon, 26 Feb 2007 16:38:00 -0500

New America in the News:

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger was playing to a growing crowd of voters, in California and across the nation, when he used his inaugural address last month to urge people to "move past partisanship'' to a new home in the political center...

It's a sentiment that appeals to the burgeoning number of voters who don't want to be identified with the Republican or Democratic parties and to the many people unwilling to be tied to their party's candidates or policies...

Nearly a fifth of California voters are registered as "decline to state" ...[which] includes voters who are ultraconservative and others on the extreme left, but polls done by the policy institute show that most of them fall in the broad political center...

Decline-to-state voters are younger, with 27 percent under the age of 34, compared with 16 percent for the Democrats and 14 percent for Republicans. More than half of those voters are college graduates, a higher percentage than in either of the major parties.

And considering that they have an average income well over the state average, California's independent voters "are like a young professional group compared to the other parties,'' said David Lesher, director of the "post-partisan" New America Foundation's California project...

Despite the growth of centrist voters, the country's political choices -- and the candidates who will make them -- continue to be dictated by Democrats and Republicans. And a [poll] by the policy institute in October indicated 71 percent of California independents thought Republicans and Democrats were doing such a poor job of representing the American people that a third party was needed.

However, those results could be as much anger at a system where centrist voters are locked out as a longing for sweeping changes in the country's political system, said Lesher of the New America Foundation.

"Are we seeing the birth of a third party or are these people independent because they don't want to be a member of any party?'' he asked. "Many of these voters enjoy the freedom to look at candidates across the spectrum.''

For the complete article, please visit the San Francisco Chronicle website.

Crime or Punishment

Articles — Sun, 18 Feb 2007 19:28:00 -0500

Sacramento lawmakers are in a trap. U.S. District Judge Lawrence Karlton will decide in little more than three months whether to set a population cap on the state’s vastly overcrowded prison system, potentially forcing the early release of thousands of convicted criminals. To keep the court at bay, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has asked the Legislature to approve billions in new prison construction money, and to consider revising sentencing and parole laws to put fewer criminals behind bars.

The trap is this: California voters want criminals locked up, as they demonstrated again last year when they overwhelmingly passed an initiative that toughened… more

New America Survey Shows Overwhelming Support for California Citizens Assembly

Communications — Wed, 13 Dec 2006 04:32:00 -0500

Contact: Steven Hill (415-6655044) or David Lesher (916-448-3721)

The poll analysis, survey questions and results are available for download in PDF format.

SACRAMENTO, CA – As Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger calls for more competition in elections, a survey commissioned by the New America Foundation finds that nearly three-quarters of California voters would like to see the governor and the Legislature create a citizen’s panel to explore ideas for making the state’s election process more fair and competitive. If lawmakers did not convene the panel, two-thirds said they would vote for an initiative to create one.

The findings… more

California Event: Health Care Reform

Communications — Wed, 06 Dec 2006 02:00:00 -0500

A New America Event
12/05/2006 - 8:00am

Governor Schwarzenegger has said that the top goal he will announce next year is to expand health insurance coverage to all Californians. This half-day conference was designed to provide him and others with fresh answers to the hard questions of how coverage expansion can be financed and how responsibility could be shared among families, employers, and government.

Presenters ranged from state officials, private employers, health policy advocates, as well as experts from academia, think tanks, and international consulting firms. California's Secretary of Health Kim Belshé kicked off the discussion,while luncheon keynote speaker Mitch Katz, Director of the San Francisco Health Department, offered lessons from that city’s experience.

Selected presentation slides and other materials from the conference can be downloaded below. Video of the keynote address is available at right, or use the links below to view other specific segments.

ABC Affiliate Interviews David Lesher on California Health Coverage

Communications — Wed, 06 Dec 2006 00:15:00 -0500

New America in the News:

ABC's KGO-TV featured David Lesher, director of New America's California Program, in a recent piece on Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger (R-CA).

Excerpts from the transcript appear below. For the complete article, and to watch the news clip, please visit the ABC News website.

KGO - State lawmakers got an earful today from Governor Schwarzenegger as he unveiled his plans for the new term. While new legislators are still learning their way around the capitol, the governor made it clear he thinks there should be more new members.

Governor Schwarzenegger unveiled today the first major proposal of his 2007 agenda - it's to have an independent citizen group redraw political district lines. He's unhappy that in the last three state elections, only four out of 459 congressional and legislative seats changed parties.

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger: "That is evidence of a system that has become unresponsive and is stuck in a status quo. We must bring competition back to the political process."

The governor's anxiously-awaited plan to provide health coverage to California's more than 6,000,000 uninsured is still in the works though.

Just today, a think tank group called the New America Foundation held a forum on the importance of tackling the problem as soon as possible.

David Lesher, New America Foundation: "The cost of health insurance for those who are paying for it are paying for those who are uninsured -- so there's an unfairness in the costs..."

David Lesher Discusses Redistricting in San Jose Mercury News

Communications — Fri, 10 Nov 2006 19:39:00 -0500

New America in the News:

SACRAMENTO - Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger is signaling that he will push strongly for redistricting reform next year to change California's gerrymandered election process, relying on the same bipartisan course he steered successfully this year.

Voters rejected the governor's redistricting ballot initiative in last year's special election. Legislative leaders were unable to work out a deal in time for this November's vote, but there appears to be renewed interest from both parties to fix a flawed system...

Doolittle rejected any approach that would involve retired judges, such as Schwarzenegger's failed initiative from a year ago, Proposition 77. Under that plan, a panel of three retired judges would draw new districts.

Other proposed schemes involve commissions of voters chosen at random by the secretary of state's office or panels comprised of partisans and independents.

All those ideas are up for discussion in the next legislative session, said David Lesher, head of the New America Foundation's California program, which has lobbied for reforms. But he said even with the most nonpartisan deal, it's likely that only 10 to 15 percent of California's legislative and congressional seats would be competitive.

"California's so balkanized, with concentrations of Democrats in urban areas and concentrations of Republicans in rural areas, there will always be seats like Doolittle's in California," he said.

Still, he added, "I think there are still far too many seats that should be more competitive than they are..."

For the complete article, please visit the San Jose Mercury News website.