California Insider

From Pia Lopez:

Adam Mendelsohn in the governor's office has said that while SB2x 12 merely reiterates state law allowing voluntary transfers of inmates to federal and out-of-state facilities, the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation is still fighting to get an involuntary transfer provision. Stay tuned.

A joint Senate-Assembly hearing on the four-bill package (see earlier blog item) is now scheduled for between 5 p.m. and 6 p.m. in Room 4202 of the Capitol.

--Pia Lopez

From Pia Lopez:

The governor and legislative leaders have made a deal in the special session on prisons. Four bills have been introduced. Given all the questions legislators raised in hearings and charges of vague proposals with insufficient details, these bills oddly accept the governor’s prison building package.

The most important is SBx2 10.

This essentially gives blanket authority to the corrections department to build new prison beds with $312 million from the General Fund and revenue bonds for costs up to $606 million.

The projects:

--5,340 new beds at existing prison facilities (where? what level of security?) using the design-build process, which means the department would not have to do a cumulative impact analysis or consider alternatives;

--10,900 new beds at existing prisons or on land owned by the department adjacent to existing prisons (where? what level of security?);

--an undisclosed number and location of re-entry facilities, each up to 500 beds, in collaboration with local governments in urban areas for inmates within one year of release;

--new facilities to provide medical, mental health and long-term care on land owned by the department;

--new correctional officer training academy in southern California, no location stated;

--convert 800 female beds at the California Rehabilitation Center to house male inmates;

--convert the closed Northern California Women’s Facility in Stockton for use as a reception center (where male prisoners are processed before being sent to a regular prison).

SBx2 9 gives the corrections department authority to contract for new community corrections beds, with an important change. It creates an unworkable hybrid of state prison guards and private staff, with no indication of who will be in charge. The bill has no funding.

SBx2 11 and SBx2 12 are minor, innocuous bills.

SBx2 11 appropriates $25 million for county challenge grants (requiring a 25 percent local match) to create re-entry programs for parolees. The amount is so small that a county might be able to create a program for 20 inmates.

SBx2 12 essentially reiterates existing state law providing for voluntary transfer of inmates to federal or out-of-state facilities. The department dropped the idea of forcing inmate transfers.

The bills were drafted Monday night with promises of a joint Senate-Assembly hearing on this 4-bill package today -- though rumor is that the bills may be sent directly to the floor for a vote. Anyone who wants to influence the outcome will have to act fast.

Those of us on the Bee editorial board are disappointed we never get invited to the fundraisers lawmakers schedule while they are dealing with key legislation at the end of the session. In fact, we don't even know what we're missing.

So, lobbyists, help us out! Fax us or email us some of the invitations you have received recently -- and especially in the last couple of days. We’d like to experience the thrill, if only vicariously. Fax them to Stuart Leavenworth at (916) 321-1996 or sleavenworth@sacbee.com. Discretion is assured.

A package of bills to reform flood control in the Central Valley appears to be dead after a meeting orchestrated by Sen. Pro Tem Don Perata on Monday night.
The meeting was supposed to be a work session, where Assemblywoman Lois Wolk and others presented possible amendments to their legislation. But according to several in the room, Wolk barely got a chance to talk. State Sen. Mike Machado, D-Linden, lit into Wolk for not working with him and for pushing legislation, AB 1899, that would hurt Stockton, which is in his district.
Stockton is a center of a major building boom in the floodplain. Developers such as Art Spanos, Fritz Grupe and other have plans to build thousands of more houses behind levees. If Wolk’s bill had passed, Stockton and other cities would be required to demonstrate they have 100-year flood protection before any new building is approved.
Wolk’s staff denies that Machado was left out of the loop. They say he kept “raising the goal post” with issues to be resolved. Wolk has provided this blog with a list of 20 concessions made to the bill as it moved through committees.
Many in the Capitol assume Perata was influenced by a $500,000 contribution that one of his bond committees received from the California Building Industry Association, a major opponent of AB 1899. Perata denies this, but is offering some pretty bogus reasons for bottling up the bill. First he said Gov. Schwarzenegger was trying to "gut" it, and didn't want it vetoed. Then he said there wasn't time to handle such complex legislation, even as he was pushing through major changes in worker's comp and health care that the governor is likely to veto. Then he accused the Assembly of "incompetance" in handling AB 1899, suggesting he didn't really want to save it from a veto, but kill it altogether.
Perata is scheduled to make an announcement on the flood bills later this afternoon. He could either bottle up at least six bills or let a few out, such as one by Sen. Dean Florez to reform the state Reclamation Board.
If all or most of these die, it will be a truly amazing development. Polls show deep concern about flooding in the Central Valley. Yet even at the one-year anniversary of Katrina, the Legislature is prepared to do almost nothing about the problem. Wow.
-- Stuart Leavenworth