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Friday, Mar 29, 2024

How They Vote Should Matter to You

When I ask people what criteria they use to measure the performance of a veteran legislator when they decide who to vote for, most often I am told that performance measurement doesn’t enter into their voting decision. Unfortunately, many people vote strictly on the basis of personality, charisma, intuition, party slate mailers or what their friends suggest. To me, this is not surprising but still very disappointing. Upon further questioning as to why performance measurement is not considered, it appears that many voters don’t know what measurements to use or where to find adequate information to enable the measurement process. One of the criteria that a business person should be concerned about is the candidate’s voting record with regard to bills that affect business. This month I am providing the voting records of the California legislators currently representing our valley with respect to a number of 2007 bills that I consider to be bad for business and bad for jobs. This information is as follows: SB 936: This bill increases the number of weeks that permanent disability benefits are paid in each of the next three years, resulting in a doubling of benefits by the third year regardless of severity and without relying on empirical data to validate the increase. The effect of this bill is to increase the cost of hiring and retaining employees thereby causing a disincentive for employers to create new jobs. This bill modifies the sweeping reforms made in 2004 that resulted in a significant reduction in workers’ compensation premiums for most California employers. STATUS: Passed Senate and Assembly, vetoed by Governor on 10/12/07. Valley Legislators voting for bill: Senate: Kuehl, Padilla, Scott; Assembly: Brownley, Feuer, Fuentes, Krekorian, Levine. Valley Legislators voting against bill: Senate: McClintock, George Runner; Assembly: Smyth. Valley Legislators absent, abstaining, or not voting: Assembly: Strickland AB 888: This bill requires new commercial buildings that are 50,000 feet or greater with permit applications completed after 1/1/2013 to be designed, constructed and operated to meet standards prescribed by a private entity (United States Green Building Council) unless the state adopts specified minimum green building standards with which the buildings must comply. This bill would usurp the power of the California Building Standards Commission, create a bias for the use of foreign grown bamboo and wheatgrass over California wood building construction materials and result in significant cost increases for builders and occupants of commercial buildings. This would be yet another cost that would reduce California’s competitive standing with other states and could result in a significant loss of jobs. Status: Passed Assembly and Senate, vetoed by Governor on 10/14/2007. Valley Legislators voting for bill: Assembly: Brownley, Feuer Fuentes, Krekorian, Levine; Senate: Kuehl, Padilla, Scott. Valley Legislators voting against bill: Assembly: Smyth; Senate: McClintock, George Runner. Valley Legislators absent, abstaining, or not voting: Assembly: Strickland. AB 448: This bill would allow employees to recover liquidated damages in minimum wage complaints brought before the Labor Commissioner. Allowing such damages on administrative claims when there are already civil actions available would be especially harmful to small employers by placing them at an extreme disadvantage. While the employers would have to expend significant time and funds to respond to claims, the workers would have their claims prosecuted by the state at no charge to them. These small employers could be forced to pay the damages whether or not they would ultimately be found liable because they could not afford the loss of time and money to defend themselves against a plaintiff with unlimited funds. This bill would be another disincentive for creating new jobs and could result in the loss of many existing jobs. Status: Passed Assembly and Senate, vetoed by Governor on 10/13/2007. Valley Legislators voting for bill: Assembly: Brownley, Feuer, Krekorian, Levine; Senate: Kuehl, Padilla, Scott. Valley Legislators voting against bill: Assembly: Smyth, Strickland; Senate: McClintock, George Runner. AB 1618: This bill repeals the interest expense offset provision of the California Corporation Tax Law thereby resulting in additional taxes. It has been characterized as a codification of a seven-year old United States Supreme Court decision relative to how corporations determine their net taxable income. The reality is that the Supreme Court decision dealt with facts specific to companies based outside California and the Franchise Tax Board has appropriately (for the past seven years)not applied it to California-based companies. This bill would not only impact California-based companies that are not impacted by the Court’s decision it would increase the costs of doing business for most or all of California’s corporate businesses. Status: Passed Assembly and Senate, vetoed by Governor on 10/11/2007. Valley Legislators voting for bill: Assembly: Brownley, Feuer, Krekorian, Levine; Senate: Padilla, Scott. Valley Legislators absent, abstaining, or not voting: Senate: Kuehl. As shown above, these are four bills with significant negative impact on business and jobs and if not for the Governor’s vetoes, they would now be law. These bills are only a few of many that reflect a continuing unfriendly business atmosphere in California. The continued introduction and passage (by our legislators)of bills that over-regulate and over-tax businesses impede our ability to attract and retain businesses, employ our residents and generate revenues to improve our state’s economy and maintain strong credit ratings. These voting patterns are representative of the votes cast on the majority of the bills I consider to be business and job “killer” bills that were introduced this year. Although voting records are only one element of performance, and bills having a negative impact on business and jobs constitute just one category of bills introduced into the legislature, I hope the information presented above is useful and provides an indication of the importance of utilizing performance measurement in the decision-making process. Those interested in finding out more about the bills introduced each year and the names of the legislators voting for and against them will find the following website useful: [email protected]. Gregory N. Lippe, CPA, is Managing Partner of the Woodland Hills-based CPA Firm of Lippe, Hellie, Hoffer & Allison, LLP, 1st Vice-chair of the Valley Industry and Commerce Association (VICA) and a Director of First Commerce Bank.

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