Make California More Affordable for Everyone
I think we can all agree – Life is too expensive here in California. Unaffordable and unfair middle class taxes are part of the problem. My position: you deserve to keep more of your hard earned money. You shouldn’t have to worry because taxes make you have to decide between paying the mortgage, the food bill, the gas bill, into retirement, or to send yourself or your kids to college.
It’s really this simple: I support the biggest middle class tax cut in California history, and I oppose any new or higher taxes. I support Proposition 13 property tax protections. I also support public, nonpartisan audits to find and eliminate fraud, waste, and mismanagement
Keep our Beaches, Parks, and Green Spaces Pristine
One of the best things about our state is our beaches, parks, and other natural spaces. We all enjoy this aspect of California, whether it’s a trip to the forest, to the sea shore, or taking our families or friends to our local parks. Our natural beauty fuels tourism, which provides tens of thousands of good paying jobs. Keeping these places clean and safe is one of my main priorities.
Fires have ravaged many of our forests and the communities near them. I believe we need to be on a ‘war footing’ when it comes to fire: clearing brush and undergrowth, thinning and disposing dead trees, and helping homeowners protect their property from fire.
Our beaches need constant upkeep, and I have worked to make sure their sand is replenished and that toxic waste from local nuclear waste storage is moved far away, safely. Further, we need to say no to any additional off-shore oil drilling, and increase safety measures on those that already exist so that we don’t have another disaster.
While local government works hard to keep parks and other green spaces clean and safe, we have a growing problem with homeless camps and the garbage, pollution, and crime that they generate. We need to take these spaces back. Our children should be able to run around our parks without worrying about stepping in human waste or pricking themselves on a disgarded needle.
Keep People Safe
The first job of government is keeping people safe. No matter where you live you should be able to walk the street at night, not be worried about your car or home being burgled, and know that if you have students in school they are protected from gangs and drug dealers. Unfortunately, California has made people less safe by lowering penalties for property and violent crimes and letting felons out of jail early. When criminals know there are no penalties we get what we have now: increased crime of all sorts.
I oppose ‘Defunding the Police.’ I believe we need to do what it takes to have enough well-trained, properly equipped police in every community. At the same time we need to build trust with the police and some parts of our community: that’s why I support body cameras and diversification of our law enforcement. I also believe we need to repeal laws and ballot measures which have emboldened criminals and made the rest of us worry about when our car or home will be robbed.
Reduce Traffic
Every hour we spend in gridlocked traffic is an hour wasted. It’s incredibly frustrating that Sacramento has refused to build but a few miles of freeway over the past few years. As a member of the Orange County Transportation Authority I understood the need to invest in roads, freeways, and public transportation. I focused on projects that would reduce the time you sit in your car every day, including the major three-phase improvement I-5 widening from San Clemente to 73 to El Toro or the I-405 (SR-73 to I-605) project. I strongly support improving our freeways, making our roads smooth and pothole free, and expanding public transportation and making it safer and earlier to use.
Get Rid of the Dangerous Nuclear Waste
The San Onofre nuclear waste that is stored in Southern California poses a continued threat to local people and property. While experts believe that the nuclear waste, stored in canisters, is safe, we must move this waste to a non-local permanent location as soon as possible. As your Assemblymember, I’m working with local officials and federal representatives and regulators to remove the nuclear waste and move it somewhere safe far away from us and the coast.
Treat Every Taxpayer Dollar with Respect
Every dollar Sacramento wastes is a dollar we can’t use to make K-12 schools better, or reduce traffic, help the homeless, or provide services to our seniors. Think of just the $30 billion Sacramento lost in the Unemployment Office fraud disaster – think about what that money could have done. And of course every dollar Sacramento spends comes out of our pockets, money we could have spent to pay the mortgage, send kids to college, take a vacation, or retire.
As such, I believe we must demand Sacramento do everything reasonably possible to locate and eliminate fraud, waste and mismanagement. I support ongoing, public, nonpartisan audits of every California Department. They key words here are “public” so that you can see the results and “nonpartisan” because politics shouldn’t have anything to do with this.
Demand Clean Government and Decency from Our Officials
In the past few years alone there have been three members of the State Assembly who have been forced to resign. Others have been found to be sexually harassing people they work with. This is inexcusable and I believe we need to be very clear: corruption and sexual harassment are unacceptable, and officials who conduct themselves in this manner need to resign or be unelected by voters.
Reduce Homelessness Firmly but Fairly
It’s unacceptable to have more than 120,000 people living and dying in our streets. It’s unacceptable to have camps in almost every city that are dirty, open air drug markets and places of prostitution. It’s unacceptable to be accosted in the downtown streets of our cities by drug addicts and the mentally ill.
The truth is that the people who run Sacramento and our major cities have failed, are continuing to fail, and unless they change course, will fail moving forward.
We can and will do better. My solutions? Clean up the camps and garbage to keep our communities clean and safe. Dramatically increase emergency shelters with wrap around services so that we can require people sleeping in the streets to spend the night there and start getting them the help they need. At the same time we need to declare a State of Emergency in California and immediately pour resources into treatment centers for drug addiction and mental illness, and change laws that make it difficult to mandate in-person treatment. We need to enforce rules against public use of drugs. While we solve this problem, firmly but fairly, we need to make sure we have the police we need to keep our property and people safe.