Final hours of the COVID Legislature + The time someone questioned Berryhill’s heart + CPUC turmoil
Good morning and welcome to the new week! Have you caught your breath from last week yet?
RACE TO THE DEADLINE
What a year it’s been. And tonight, it comes to an end. (Unless, of course, Gov. Gavin Newsom calls a special session.)
It feels like we’ve crawled to the finish line, that it was another lifetime that SB 50 died in the Senate in January, or that Newsom dedicated nearly his entire February State of the State address to homelessness.
But as slow as this year has felt - excruciatingly slow during quarantine — if 2020 has taught us anything, it’s how quickly lawmakers can actually get things done.
Like when the state finds itself battling in a global pandemic, reckoning with a national call for greater police accountability or needing to plug a $54 billion budget shortfall.
Since mid-March, when lawmakers approved $1 billion in emergency aid before they recessed for the first time as coronavirus cases began climbing in the Golden State, the Legislature has thrown together and passed bills and budget ideas with unprecedented speed.
With just days before they were scheduled to recess for the year, members were still dropping bills and tax credits as late as Thursday and Friday.
The latecomers included:
Juvenile justice: A proposal to transfer responsibility for the state’s youth offenders to local governments, AB 1868, posted Friday night and could become law on Tuesday.
Help for undocumented: Even advocates for undocumented Californians were surprised to see SB 831 appear late Thursday, aiming to open up the California Earned Income Tax Credit to all income-eligible residents regardless of immigration status.
Hiring tax credits: Late Thursday, a new bill proposing $100 million in tax credits for small businesses that lost revenue during the early months of the coronavus outbreak and hire or rehire workers before Nov. 30. That’s SB 1447.
Eviction ban, kind of: And the big one, AB 3088. It’s Newsom’s deal to prevent most evictions during the pandemic.
Will they make to the end? We shall see in the day to come.
TOM BERRYHILL’S ‘HEART FOR CALIFORNIA’
In eulogizing former Sen. Tom Berryhill this weekend, more than one California lawmaker commended him for recovering from a heart transplant surgery 18 years go and going on to serve in the Legislature for a dozen years.
“He was a dedicated legislator, a friend, and had a heart for California and for its people,” Senate President Pro Tem Toni Atkins said Sunday.
Fourteen years ago a political adversary tried to use that transplant for a different purpose — to question whether Republican Berryhill could survive a single term in the Assembly.
It read “in bold red letters,” as The Modesto Bee described at the time, “‘Tom Berryhill Doesn’t have the HEART for State Assembly.” It suggested he’d die within a year, failing voters and running up medical bills on the taxpayer’s dime.
The Modesto Bee’s columnist at the time, Jeff Jardine, labeled it “pure gutter.” Berryhill cruised to election that year.
His passing hung over the early hours of floor sessions Saturday and Sunday, when his former colleagues shared memories of the Republican from Ceres who died at 67.
They recalled him as a cordial lawmaker who nudged them to build bipartisan relationships and take time for the annual jumping frog contest at the Capitol. His father, the late Clare Berryhill, served as secretary of agriculture in the George Deukmejian administration. His brother, Bill Berryhill, also served in the Assembly.
“Our community has lost a giant. Tom Berryhill led a dedicated life of service to his community both in the California Legislature and the Stanislaus County Board of Supervisors,” said Sen. Andreas Borgeas, R-Fresno. He teared up Sunday during a eulogy.
CPUC CHIEF ON THE HOTSEAT
The testy relationship between California Public Utilities Commission Executive Director Alice Stebbins and her bosses the commissioners is about to get a public airing.
The commission is set Monday morning to hold a hearing for the “consideration and possible action to dismiss” Stebbins.
The hearing will include an estimated 15-minute opening statement from the commission, followed by a 45-minute presentation by Stebbins.
Stebbins is accused in a State Personnel Board report of engaging in “highly questionable” hiring practices in her capacity as executive director.
Stebbins’ attorney Karl Olson has called that report “a witch hunt,” and Stebbins denies making any inappropriate hires.
Both sides dug in. The PUC on Tuesday sent Olson a letter standing by its move to discipline Stebbins over her hiring.
“Ms. Stebbins’ actions after receiving the SPB report have not been those of a leader who is concerned about the integrity of the state’s merit-based civil service system. Rather, she has been defensive, hostile and insubordinate. Instead of working to address the findings and taking the actions the SPB has directed be taken, she has repeatedly asked for the report to be suppressed and failed to take responsibility for her conduct cited in the report,” reads the letter to Olson from Suzanne Solomon, a private attorney representing the PUC.
The hearing begins at 10 a.m., and you can watch it here.
QUOTE OF THE DAY
“This is one test I was glad to fail. It confirms what I had suspected - that I did not contract the Coronavirus from one of my colleagues last week.”
Sen. Scott Wilk
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