Owning PG&E’s ‘problems’ + Chamber sues over arbitration law + Biden secures healthy lead

Happy Wednesday, California! Thanks for starting your day with the Capitol Alert.

WHO SHOULD OWN PG&E’S ‘PROBLEMS?’

When it comes to Pacific Gas and Electric Company’s future, California voters want change. They’re just not sure what that change should look like.

In a Tuesday poll out of Berkeley Institute of Governmental Studies, “slightly more than one in three voters” said they’d support an end to PG&E as an investor-owned utility. Instead, they reported support for a takeover by a state agency, smaller city or county cooperatives.

A quarter of the 3,482 registered voters surveyed said they’d support splintering PG&E into separate gas and electric divisions, or selling the utility to another company. Twelve percent said they favor things as they are.

Twenty-eight percent “remain undecided.”

More than half of the Republicans surveyed support an investor-owned utility maintaining responsibility for “PG&E’s problems.” Nearly half of Democrats, on the other hand, back the idea of government agencies taking control.

The Legislature should take notice that about three-quarters of surveyed voters support involving state regulators in future decisions on “when and where future power outages should be allowed to occur.”

“A wide range of responses are given when voters were asked their opinions about the best path forward to fix the problems facing PG&E after it emerges from bankruptcy,” wrote Mark DiCamillo, director of the poll. “While their answers reveal broad voter support for changing the way PG&E operates, no single alternative receives the support of more than 20 percent statewide.”

LEGAL ACTION TO STOP LEGAL ACTION

The California Chamber of Commerce announced on Tuesday that it filed a lawsuit in the Eastern District of California to block a new law that ends forced arbitration between employees and their workers.

The plaintiffs are asking for declaratory and injunctive relief against Assembly Bill 51, which they allege violates their federal rights to arbitration agreements.

The coalition argues that businesses “routinely” enter into such agreements, which are used to settle controversy between employee and employer without roping in the courts.

The chamber deemed AB 51 a “job killer” this year, saying it would do little to settle disputes but would rather delay claims and benefit trial attorneys.

“It doesn’t make sense to place businesses at risk for criminal penalties for a practice that has been favored by California and federal law and consistently upheld by the courts,” said chamber President and CEO Allan Zaremberg in a press release. “While it may not serve the best interests of the trial lawyers, expeditious resolution through the arbitration process serves the interests of employees and employers.”

Bill author and San Diego Democrat Lorena Gonzalez, a longtime champion for workers, said arbitration can be a “highly effective tool,” but only when both parties choose it “freely.”

“It doesn’t work when corporations say you won’t be hired unless you sign away your rights,” Gonzalez said in an emailed statement. “The state of California has a duty to protect workers on the job, and Assembly Bill 51 says employers can’t tell workers they will only get a job by signing away their rights. It should come as a surprise to no one that big business is challenging this common sense law.”

BIDEN’S BOOM

Former Vice President Joe Biden is locked in the lead among the many candidates pursuing the White House.

Sitting pretty with the likely vote from 29 percent of Democratic and independent voters surveyed in the latest Quinnipiac University poll, Biden is “in the best position that he has been since the end of the summer.”

Trailing Biden is Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, with 17 percent of the likely vote, and Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren, with 15 percent. South Bend Mayor Pete Buttigieg is hanging in the race with a 9-percent support from the respondents.

“This is the first time Biden has had a double-digit lead since August, and Sanders’ best number since June,” said polling analyst Tim Malloy. “While Warren’s numbers seem to have stabilized, Buttigieg’s numbers have dipped.”

Biden’s campaign revealed Wednesday morning it has the support of five state lawmakers and one Democratic National Committee member. Bob Mulholland, the DNC member who previously backed California Sen. Kamala Harris, would serve as an unpledged delegate and is able to help determine the party nominee if no candidate captures a majority of pledged delegates in the first round of voting at the convention. Biden also earned the support of Assembly members Mike Gipson and Autumn Burke state Sens. Bob Archuleta and Jerry Hill and former Assemblyman Mike Eng.

Other notable numbers:

• More than half of the voters surveyed, 51 percent, said President Donald Trump should not be impeached and removed from office. Forty-five percent support the effort.
• Biden would win against Trump in a 51-42 race if the general election were today. A Warren-Trump election would likely produce a 50-43 outcome, while a Sanders-Trump battle would probably conclude with a 51-43 race.
• Trump earned a win with 54 percent of the voters who said they approve of the economy, and 57 percent said they’re in a better financial situation than three years ago.
• Still, only 41 percent of the respondents said they approve of Trump’s work overall.

SPLIT-ROLL

One of the most controversial measures that could be on the ballot in November 2020 hit a milestone recently, securing 25 percent of the nearly 1 million signatures required to qualify.

The ballot initiative, deemed Schools and Communities First, is a renewed attempt to require commercial and industrial properties to be assessed based on their “current market value,” according to the Secretary of State’s office.

The proposal would overhaul Proposition 13, a 40-year-old law that limits property taxes based on their purchase value. The initiative would exempt small businesses and homeowners, but is still estimated to generate up to $12 billion a year in revenue to be used by public schools, community colleges and local governments.

Opponents say the initiative would raise property taxes, burden businesses and is part of the reason California is on “the verge of another taxpayer revolt.”

Despite the controversy, the 25 percent benchmark is “testament to the momentum” behind the idea, said Alex Stack, Schools and Communities First spokesman.

“The writing is on the wall,” Stack wrote in a press release. “Californians are ready to reclaim $12 billion every year for schools and local communities by closing corporate tax loopholes.”

QUOTE OF THE DAY

“Daily thought: Don’t like what your employer did? Stand up. Organize. Fight back. You deserve more. You deserve better. Put the blame on the boss: not other workers, or unions, or laws. People who work outnumber those who employ workers. There is power in numbers & solidarity.”

- Assemblywoman Lorena Gonzalez via Twitter. Responses to her message largely targeted Assembly Bill 5, a union-backed law that will change in 2020 how employers classify their workers.

Best of The Bee:

• Thousands of lawful California gun owners are denied ammunition purchases. Here’s why, by Ryan Sabalow

• A dozen Catholic dioceses in California will be subpoenaed for additional records as the state attorney general continues to investigate whether dioceses complied with mandatory sexual abuse reporting requirements, by Alexandra Yoon-Hendricks

• Anti-vaccine advocates abandoned plans for an initiative that would undo a new law restricting medical exemptions for vaccines, by Andrew Sheeler

This story was originally published December 11, 2019 at 4:55 AM.