Please ensure Javascript is enabled for purposes of website accessibility

Tensions Between Some Tahoe Residents and Wildlife Workers Become Unbearable

20 hours ago

California Republican Leader Calls for ‘Two State Solution’ Amid Redistricting Fight

21 hours ago

Three Dead in Minneapolis Shooting, Including Shooter, Justice Department Official Says

22 hours ago

Israeli Tanks Close in on Gaza City, Trump to Chair Meeting

23 hours ago

Trump Says Soros and His Son Should Be Charged With RICO

23 hours ago

Wall Street Opens Muted in Countdown to Nvidia Earnings

23 hours ago

Fresno Leaders Voice ‘Full Support’ for Pismo’s Restaurant Manager in ICE Custody

2 days ago

Poll: Katie Porter Holds Early Edge in California Governor’s Race

2 days ago

Just 38% of Americans Support Trump’s Use of Troops to Police DC, Reuters/Ipsos Poll Finds

2 days ago

California Farming Couple Seeks $300 Million for Aspen Estate

2 days ago
Walters: Banning Not Just a City’s Name
Portrait of CalMatters Columnist Dan Walters
By Dan Walters, CalMatters Commentary
Published 6 years ago on
October 21, 2019

Share

Banning is the name of a small city in Southern California, but also applies to a pervasive theme of the Legislature this year.
The 1,042 bills that passed the Legislature and the 870 signed by Gov. Gavin Newsom included an extraordinary number that used the state’s police powers to prohibit activities deemed to violate the Capitol’s often unique sensibilities.


Dan Walters
Opinion
They ranged from the semi-ridiculous, such as banning tiny plastic bottles of shampoo and other toiletries from hotel rooms, to the obviously justified, such as tightening up the ban on unvaccinated school children.
Guns and gun owners were the targets of several legislated bans, such as one on gun shows in San Diego County’s Del Mar fairgrounds and another to limit purchases of rifles to no more than one every 30 days, emulating a pre-existing limit on handgun purchases.
Some of the newly minted prohibitions would affect, or even erase, whole economic sectors, such as eliminating cash bail, banning the sale of some animals, barring circuses from using elephants and other wild animals in their shows, or making it difficult, if not impossible, to work on contract, rather than as a payroll employee.

Newsom Is a More Conventional Liberal

The latter, if not overturned by voters, is one of several union-sponsored bills aimed at changing employer-employee relationships in favor of the latter. Another would prohibit employers from requiring binding arbitration of disputes as a precondition to employment.
In signing both the binding arbitration ban and another measure prohibiting smoking on state beaches and in state parks, Newsom departed sharply from his predecessor, Jerry Brown, who had a streak of libertarianism and sometimes rejected bills he saw as going too far down the path of official nannyism.
Brown vetoed beach smoking bans three times, saying last year, “Third time is not always a charm. My opinion on the matter has not changed. We have many rules telling us what we can’t do and these are wide open spaces.”
Newsom is a more conventional liberal, or “progressive” in the preferred nomenclature of those on the left side of the political scale, and generally endorses their latter-day puritanism.
That said, during his first experience with the Legislature’s 11th-hour blizzard of more than 700 bills approved before adjournment in September, Newsom did show a bit of political fortitude.
Clearly worried about a slowing economy, the freshman governor rejected several bills that would have committed the state budget to multi-billion-dollar spending increases backed by influential interest groups.

Newsom Signed a Bill to Require the State’s Middle and High Schools to Eliminate Early Classes

One would have reinstated a new version of redevelopment, which local governments once used to remake neighborhoods deemed to be blighted. Brown and the Legislature eliminated redevelopment seven years ago, and the revised version Newsom vetoed would have cost the state budget as much as $2 billion a year. In doing so, he bucked local governments and construction unions.
Newsom also vetoed legislation that local governments and their unions had wanted to change the wording of local ballot measures for a tax increase and bond as they were presented to voters. Such measures must now be up-front with voters on their financial consequences, but local officials wanted to bury that information in the voter pamphlet.
Finally, Newsom signed a bill to require the state’s middle and high schools to eliminate early classes that, pediatric physicians said, were depriving teenagers of much-needed sleep. The entire education establishment, including the very influential California Teachers Association, wanted Newsom to veto the bill that Brown had previously rejected.
Scarcely two months hence, the Legislature will return to Sacramento and the whole process will begin again.
CalMatters is a public interest journalism venture committed to explaining how California’s state Capitol works and why it matters. For more stories by Dan Walters, go to calmatters.org/commentary

DON'T MISS

What Are Fresno Real Estate Experts Predicting for 2025 and Beyond?

DON'T MISS

First California EV Mandates Hit Automakers This Year. Most Are Not Even Close

DON'T MISS

Israeli Official Accused of Nevada Sex Crime Ordered to Appear in Court via Zoom

DON'T MISS

Think You Can’t Afford College? Go Online and Get a CalKIDS Scholarship

DON'T MISS

US CDC Director Ousted Weeks Into Job

DON'T MISS

Valley Crime Stoppers’ Most Wanted Person of the Day: Mario Garcia

DON'T MISS

Shooter Kills Two Minneapolis Schoolchildren in Church, Injures 17

DON'T MISS

Did Fresno Restaurateur Bobby Salazar Commit Arson? Feds Lay Out Their Case

DON'T MISS

Hanford Police Arrest Two Teens After Shootouts Leave 17-Year-Old Wounded

DON'T MISS

US CDC Director Being Ousted Weeks Into Job, Washington Post Reports

DON'T MISS

Israeli Foreign Minister Saar Says There Will Not Be a Palestinian State

DON'T MISS

All UN Security Council Members, Except US, Say Famine in Gaza Is ‘Man-Made Crisis’

UP NEXT

Wilted Lettuce. Rotten Strawberries. Here’s What Happens When You Round Up Farmworkers.

UP NEXT

Renewal of CA Cap and Trade Program to Cut Emissions Fraught With Issues

UP NEXT

Joe Castro: A Life Cut Far Too Short, but His Legacy Marches On

UP NEXT

Why Epstein’s Furious Grip on Washington Holds

UP NEXT

I Was Preyed On for My VA Benefits. California Can Stop It

UP NEXT

My Friend Joseph Castro, Former Fresno State President and CSU Chancellor, Is Receiving Hospice Care

UP NEXT

California’s Finances Face a Perfect Storm. It Could Eventually Lead to Another Tax Hike

UP NEXT

What Trump Is Really Up to With the Military Occupation of DC

UP NEXT

Immigrant Students Shape California’s Future. Don’t Close the Door on Them

UP NEXT

Trump’s Domestic Deployments Are Dangerous. For the Military

Valley Crime Stoppers’ Most Wanted Person of the Day: Mario Garcia

15 hours ago

Shooter Kills Two Minneapolis Schoolchildren in Church, Injures 17

16 hours ago

Did Fresno Restaurateur Bobby Salazar Commit Arson? Feds Lay Out Their Case

16 hours ago

Hanford Police Arrest Two Teens After Shootouts Leave 17-Year-Old Wounded

16 hours ago

US CDC Director Being Ousted Weeks Into Job, Washington Post Reports

16 hours ago

Israeli Foreign Minister Saar Says There Will Not Be a Palestinian State

17 hours ago

All UN Security Council Members, Except US, Say Famine in Gaza Is ‘Man-Made Crisis’

17 hours ago

Trump’s Tax Bill Expands 0% Capital Gains Eligibility in 2025

18 hours ago

Second-Highest Unemployment Rate Still In California

18 hours ago

Trump Holds Gaza Policy Meeting With Blair and Kushner, White House Official Says

18 hours ago

Israeli Official Accused of Nevada Sex Crime Ordered to Appear in Court via Zoom

An Israeli official accused of trying to meet a 15-year-old girl for sex outside Las Vegas has been ordered to appear via videolink next wee...

15 hours ago

The flag of the U.S. state Nevada is seen in this illustration taken, August 21, 2024. (Reuters/Dado Ruvic/Illustration)
15 hours ago

Israeli Official Accused of Nevada Sex Crime Ordered to Appear in Court via Zoom

15 hours ago

Think You Can’t Afford College? Go Online and Get a CalKIDS Scholarship

Susan Monarez, U.S. President Donald Trump's nominee to be director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, testifies before a Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee confirmation hearing on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C., U.S., June 25, 2025. (Reuters File)
15 hours ago

US CDC Director Ousted Weeks Into Job

Mario Garcia is Valley Crime Stoppers' Most Wanted Person of the Day for August 27, 2025. (Valley Crimes Stoppers)
15 hours ago

Valley Crime Stoppers’ Most Wanted Person of the Day: Mario Garcia

Law enforcement use K-9 dogs to search a nearby neighborhood, after a shooting at Annunciation Church, which is also home to an elementary school, in Minneapolis, Minnesota, U.S. August 27, 2025. REUTERS/Tim Evans
16 hours ago

Shooter Kills Two Minneapolis Schoolchildren in Church, Injures 17

Bobby Salazar motorcycle gang fire restaurant Blackstone fresno insurance fraud
16 hours ago

Did Fresno Restaurateur Bobby Salazar Commit Arson? Feds Lay Out Their Case

A 17-year-old boy was shot and wounded in Hanford, and police arrested two juvenile suspects in connection with the shootings. (Hanford PD)
16 hours ago

Hanford Police Arrest Two Teens After Shootouts Leave 17-Year-Old Wounded

Susan Monarez, U.S. President Donald Trump's nominee to be director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, testifies before a Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee confirmation hearing on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C., U.S., June 25, 2025. (Reuters File)
16 hours ago

US CDC Director Being Ousted Weeks Into Job, Washington Post Reports

Search

Help continue the work that gets you the news that matters most.

Send this to a friend