Nonpartisan Union Reform

California Local Elected Officials: Protect the Independence of Local Governments

California Local Elected Officials: Protect the Independence of Local Governments

Sign the Letter of Opposition to SCA 7 California’s powerful union leaders are at it again. State lawmakers are backing a bill that would give the state’s public-sector unions veto power over any state or local government decision in California. That’s why California Policy Center (CPC) is asking local elected officials among California’s 58 counties...

By California Policy Center

DeSantis Battles the Teachers Union

DeSantis Battles the Teachers Union

Fighting for a sane measure for educators. Years ago, when I was teaching, I asked then United Teachers of Los Angeles president A.J. Duffy at a union meeting why teachers weren’t responsible for paying their own dues. He replied, “They might forget.” I didn’t respond, but knew that some of my colleagues were thinking what...

By Larry Sand

San Francisco’s $1.7 Million Public Toilet

San Francisco’s $1.7 Million Public Toilet

If you want to know where California’s headed, dragging the rest of America in its wake, consider the $1.7 million single public toilet San Francisco is going to install in the city’s Noe Valley neighborhood. Don’t hold your breath, by the way, because if we’re lucky, the toilet will be available to the public sometime in 2025....

By Edward Ring

Government Union Money Dwarfs Corporate Influence in California Elections

Government Union Money Dwarfs Corporate Influence in California Elections

The disparity in fundraising in California between Democrats and Republicans is systemic. From statewide offices to local races, government unions — not corporations — make or break candidates, and it’s not even close. A survey of  California’s Secretary of State website will debunk any suggestion that Democrats are protecting California’s citizens from the big bad corporations. If...

By Edward Ring

Why We Fight Government Unions

Why We Fight Government Unions

The California Policy Center, established in 2013, exists to expose and undermine the destructive power of government unions. Most Californians still don’t understand the threat these unions represent to the integrity of our democracy, the agenda of our politicians, and the solvency of our public institutions. Government unions, sometimes also referred to as public sector...

By Edward Ring

‘Progressive’ LA District Attorney protects the union that protects bad cops

‘Progressive’ LA District Attorney protects the union that protects bad cops

By Dennis Hull | California Policy Center By the time we saw him kneeling on George Floyd’s neck, Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin already had at least 17 excessive-force complaints against him, just one of which ended in disciplinary action. Neither the city’s progressive city council nor its black police chief could alter that tragedy...

By Editorial Staff

L.A. teachers in open rebellion – this time against their own union leaders

L.A. teachers in open rebellion – this time against their own union leaders

Union chief Caputo-Pearl: “This agreement is horrible,” a teacher wrote on UTL:A’s Facebook page. “It was not worth striking 7 minutes let alone 7 days!!! Our union has let us down once again.” (AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes) LOS ANGELES — L.A. teachers on Tuesday voted on a deal their union calls “historic.” But by then, the...

By Mark Bucher

Disunion: Union membership in key school district fell dramatically after Janus

Disunion: Union membership in key school district fell dramatically after Janus

CLASS WAR: Teachers union activists and supporters surround Santa Ana school district candidate Angie Cano, April 2018. Cano, a school choice activist, was attempting to speak at a district board meeting. Police escorted her into the building. Union membership in California’s sixth-largest school district fell rapidly in 2018, perhaps signaling a broader statewide decline following...

By Editorial Staff

Public Servant Who Made $327,491 in 2017 Asks Us to Support Higher Taxes

Public Servant Who Made $327,491 in 2017 Asks Us to Support Higher Taxes

Every two years, around this time, political mailers inundate the mailboxes of California’s registered voters. This week, many Sacramento residents received “Vote No on Prop 6″ mailer. Prop 6 is that pesky, subversive citizens ballot initiative that, if approved by voters, will roll back the gas tax. But Prop. 6 isn’t the topic here. Rather,...

By Edward Ring

Brown’s union ploy shows unions still fear end to mandatory dues

Brown’s union ploy shows unions still fear end to mandatory dues

Sacramento On first blush, the latest effort by Gov. Jerry Brown and Democratic legislators to give public-employee unions access to public agencies to hold “orientation” seminars with new hires is an unfair special privilege not normally provided to private groups. It’s even more disturbing that the legislation authorizing such access is being rammed through the...

By Steven Greenhut

Teachers’ unions losing the long battle over parental choice

Teachers’ unions losing the long battle over parental choice

Sacramento — Supporters of charter schools, homeschooling and other forms of school “choice” are so used to fighting in the trenches against the state’s muscular teachers’ unions that they often forget how much progress they’ve made in the last decade or so. Recent events have shown the degree of progress, even if they still face...

By Steven Greenhut

What if California’s Government Never Unionized?

What if California’s Government Never Unionized?

A story that still makes the rounds in Sacramento is that Governor Jerry Brown, speaking off-the-record to a group of business leaders back around 2009, admitted that the worst political decision of his life was signing legislation to permit public employees to form unions and engage in collective bargaining. Whether or not Governor Brown actually...

By Edward Ring

State Budget Could Be Capped by “Gann Limit,” Preventing New Taxes

State Budget Could Be Capped by “Gann Limit,” Preventing New Taxes

Editor’s Note: For a summary of how state legislators may be prevented by law from increasing taxes any further, this article by Jon Coupal is as good as any. In a nutshell, Prop. 4 (the “Gann Limit”), passed in 1979, then modified by Prop. 111, passed in 1990, limits increases in state and local spending...

By Jon Coupal

The Biggest Dupes in the History of the World

The Biggest Dupes in the History of the World

Last week the California Policy Center released a new study that compared the average full-career government pension to the average annual earnings of a full-time private sector worker. Not surprisingly, at least for anyone paying attention, ex-government workers make 26% more than people make in the private sector who are still working. The average government...

By Edward Ring