BETTER PUBLIC SCHOOLS
Nationwide, California public schools are ranked 42nd in quality of education, near the bottom in both per-student funding student-teacher ratios, and we are failing to prepare students for trade and vocational careers. These facts are unacceptable. As a locally elected school board member, the solutions are clear to me. We need:
– More trade and vocational education
– Increased per-student funding
– Career counseling for parents and students
– Collaboration with teachers and parents
First, California public schools have to stop pushing and pressuring all students to go to college, and instead promote career technical education and trade/vocational career pathways in partnership with local community colleges and industry organizations. To accomplish this, we must invest in career technical education and revise our annual state testing, which is currently geared toward college-bound students, so that individual school districts aren’t faced with sacrificing high test scores by supporting career technical education.
Second, we have to alter our spending priorities and heavily invest in public education. California annually spends $9,000 per student and $62,000 per prisoner. Shouldn’t we be investing in students, not criminals? And isn’t a quality public education the best solution to high crime? It’s no coincidence that the states with the highest rated public school systems spend twice as much as we do per student, and significantly less per prisoner. Together with the California School Boards Association, I have advocated for adequacy in public school funding from Sacramento. I intend to continue those efforts as your assemblyman.
Third, to our college-bound students and their parents, we owe a duty of practical preparation. The college admissions process is daunting and difficult. Neither parents nor students feel confident that they can navigate it successfully. Wealthy parents can afford private college counseling, but what about the rest of us? Public school districts should be offering annual parent-student counseling sessions. Our college-bound students and their parents need help navigating the college admissions process. We can help by educating parents and students about the process, exploring opportunities, setting short and long term goals, and ensuring that they are on track to achieve those goals. We want all California students to be reaching their highest potential.
Finally, legislators, administrators, and teachers need to come together and work collaboratively. Public school teachers are our front-line professionals in effectively educating our students. It is our responsibility to support them with quality professional development, classroom resources, and discretion to individually refine their craft.
EMPOWERED LOCAL COMMUNITIES
As an active community servant, I can personally attest that local city councils and schools boards are the only ones in elected office that truly know the wants and needs of the people that they were elected to serve. We need to:
– Stop unreasonable state mandates
– Support public safety
– Restore control to city councils and school boards
First, Sacramento politicians are suffocating local governments with senseless state mandates, while neglecting to address chronic statewide issues. Their actions have, among other mandates, doubled the cost of public school construction projects and required our cities to clean and filter storm water runoff before releasing it into the aqueducts. Meanwhile, they are failing to address low-ranking public schools, the highest rates of unemployment, poverty, and taxation in the country, a $340 billion wall of debt, and $198 billion in unfunded pension liabilities.
Second, public safety professionals in our local police and fire departments are struggling to comply with the mountain of regulations that Sacramento politicians continue to impose upon them. In the past year alone, over 2,600 bills were introduced and over 1,000 passed. Governor Brown himself has acknowledged this problem, stating “over the last several decades, California’s criminal code has grown to more than 5,000 provisions covering every almost conceivable form of human misbehavior.” Safe communities are essential. We must support and trust our public safety professionals to do their jobs, and keep us safe.
STRONGER JOB MARKET
We hear on the news that the recession is over, and that California’s economy has improved, but we’re not feeling it. Friends and family are still unemployed, and businesses lack all confidence to expand or take any risk. We still have some of the highest rates of unemployment, poverty, and taxation in the country, and are consistently ranked the worst state for business. As a current small business owner and former federal tax attorney with an accounting background, I can see that we are imposing too many barriers to success in front of our people and businesses. We need:
– Less regulation
– Lower taxes
– Workforce development
First, our state bureaucracy is too big. We have over 500 state agencies, departments, and commissions all passing regulations that are frustrating citizens and driving-away businesses. Tesla, Toyota, Campbell’s Soup, Comcast, and Samsung have all left California recently. In a survey of 650 corporate CEO’s by Chief Executive Magazine, California has been consistently ranked as the worst state for business for the past 8 years in a row. We need smaller government and less regulation.
Second, we need to lower taxes. California has one of the highest rates of per capita taxation of any state in the nation. These high taxes are driving people and businesses out of California everyday. High income and sales taxes are leaving all of us with less take-home pay. Our legislators in Sacramento don’t understand this simple concept. Instead, they are proposing increases to our sales tax, income tax, gas tax, alcohol tax, tobacco tax, health insurance fees, and car registration fees, and to repeal Prop 13 and raise our property taxes. Instead of eliminating these job-killing taxes, they are increasing them.
Finally, we must acknowledge the labor demands of today’s economy, and respond with appropriate workforce development. More and more college graduates are finding themselves without a job in their field, while trade and vocational industries maintain an overwhelmingly high demand for qualified professionals. These industries include welding, HVAC, drafting and design, video production, plumbing, electrical, and computer science, where professionals are well compensated and enjoy job security.