Memo From the Grammar Police to California Department of Justice Lawyers

On January 7, 2013 the Brown administration filed a document with a panel of three federal judges asking them to release the state from it’s obligation to lower the population at the Golden State’s 33 prisons to 110,000 inmates – 137.5 percent of design capacity.

(There’s a little under 120,000 inmates at the moment, which is down 43,000 from the peak of overcrowding several years ago.)

This important document and its submission to the panel of judges was the subject of a press conference by the Democratic governor. Excerpts from it appeared in numerous media outlets.

Among the most popular quotes is the third sentence Read more »

More

What Was Wrong with “Avocado?”

What’s in a name?

Plenty if you’re the California Health Benefit Exchange, which plans to have a website operational by September displaying the various health care plans several million individual Californians without coverage and the operators of small businesses can purchase beginning January 1, 2014.

A key part of the exchange’s mission is to ensure more uninsured Californians become insured.

To do accomplish that, a great deal of marketing will be required. Lucky, the exchange has been given $90 million for outreach. How that $90 million will be spent — and how effectively — remains to be seen.

But Step One, Read more »

More

More on State Parks

This from the Brown Administration:

Investigation and Audit of State Parks and Recreation Department Launched in Response to Budget Irregularities and Fiscal Mismanagement 

Governor Accepts Resignation of Parks Director and Orders Resources Secretary to Conduct Sweeping Review of Parks Management 

SACRAMENTO - At the request of Governor Edmund G. Brown Jr., the state Attorney General’s Office is investigating the circumstances surrounding significant budgetary irregularities at the California Department of Parks and Recreation dating back to at least 2000. Governor Brown has also directed the state Department of Finance to conduct a comprehensive audit of Parks’ fiscal controls and the California Read more »

More

State Parks Director Resigns

Here’s the Sacramento Bee‘s acount.

More

A Look at Some “Government Efficiencies” in Jerry Brown’s Two Budgets

On page 9 of the Summary of the budget signed by Gov. Jerry brown on June 27, he listed as an accomplishment “eliminating over 50 boards, commissions, task forces, offices and departments.” 

The list below, compiled by Brown’s Department of Finance, shows what’s been eliminated or consolidated. A number of the entities are advisory bodies, whose members are not compensted.

Some, like the Electronic Funds Transfer Task Force and the American Recovery and Reinviestment Act Task Froce completed their work several years ago but their names stayed on the books. 

Others, like the Division of Labor Statistics will continue to do the work Read more »

More

Brown’s State Reorganization Plan Takes Effect — Tweaks By Lawmakers to Follow

Gov. Jerry Brown’s reorganization plan to reduce the number of state agencies from 12 to 10, took effect July 2 after lawmakers failed to reject it.

The announcement by the Democratic governor came an hour before Senate President Pro tempore Darrell Steinberg, a Sacramento Democrat, told reporters he and other legislators planned to make some changes in the proposal which Brown says streamlines the delivery of services and saves taxpayers money.

““This far-reaching plan will make government more effective and will reduce wasteful spending,” said Brown in a statement.

 The state’s Little Hoover Commission, which by law must examine such administrative Read more »

More

Status of State Park Closures

Below is a June 20 memo from the Department of Parks and Recreation on the status of the 70 parks that were scheduled for closure on July 1. Since the date of this memo, the department has said 69 of the 70 parks will remain open July 1, the original date of closure for the parks on the list.

Providence Mountains in the Mojave has already closed. Forty deals have been struck to keep parks open for at least one year and negotiations to do the same are underway on 25 of the remaining 29.

(A definition of the abbreviations used on the list is near the bottom Read more »