Governor says he will veto budget bill

In yesterday's post I said that the governor and lawmakers reached a budget deal - apparently I was only half right. While the legislative leaders struck a deal, the governor is not on board. The Los Angeles Times' Jordan Rau and Evan Halper reported this afternoon that the governor is planning to veto the proposal that lawmakers passed around 2 a.m. this morning.

Excerpt:

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger announced this afternoon that he will veto the state budget passed by the Legislature early this morning, setting the stage for an unprecedented confrontation in California's Capitol.

"When they send me the budget, I will veto it," Schwarzenegger said at a Capitol news conference. "If my veto is overriden," he said, " ... hundreds of bills will be vetoed."

Schwarzenegger had warned lawmakers in a letter last night that he would veto their spending plan -- 78 days late today -- if it did not include three provisions to ensure the state a reliable rainy day fund for times of fiscal trouble. This year, California has developed a $15.2-billion budget gap.

The Legislature agreed to two of his three requests.

A budget veto would be a first for California, but legislative leaders in both parties said early this morning that it is likely the Legislature would override it.

Legislature approval rating at record low; budget deal in the works

The news today in Sacramento is that the legislative leaders and the governor have worked out a budget deal, 2 and a half months past the deadline. This has been the longest-delayed budget in the state's history, and according to a recent Field Poll, California's lawmakers are also earning record low marks in public opinion polls.

As reported in this article by Dan Smith in the Sept. 12 Sacramento Bee:

"This is the lowest job (approval) rating recorded for anybody from any institution," said Mark DiCamillo, director of the 62-year-old Field Poll. "No one has ever gotten this low. Even Richard Nixon."

The record budget standoff – now 74 days into the fiscal year – clearly has contributed to the Legislature's slide in the eyes of the public, DiCamillo said. Eighty-two percent say the budget impasse is a "very serious" problem, up from 68 percent in July.

DiCamillo told KQED's California Report last Friday that various proposals have been made in the past, to make the legislature part time, or do a constitutional convention in which "major changes could be made in terms of how the legislature functions". He went on to say that while those kinds of proposals seem off the wall, and perhaps not in the mainstream, "in an environment where voters are almost uniformly negative I think those kinds of things might get a greater hearing.”

According to the Bee article, "Jim Wunderman, president of the San Francisco-based Bay Area Council, a business group, recently called for a constitutional convention to overhaul the state's budgeting and tax systems, among other things." It was surprising to hear DiCamillo also comment on structural governmental reform for California. Perhaps this year's budget stalemate will help move such ideas forward.

Capitol Weekly blog from Denver

My friend Anthony York, who is editor of Capitol Weekly, is in Denver this week blogging about the Democratic Convention. He is an astute political observer, has a clever way with words, and his convention blogging is off to an entertaining start. I will be checking in with his blog throughout the week to see what's happening in Denver from the perspective of a California journalist with a nose for news and whatever else he finds entertaining.

Here's an excerpt from today's blog, "Why We Blog":

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It becomes abundantly clear why there are 8 zillion bloggers swarming like little gnats around downtown Denver this week. If ever there was an event made for blogging, it is a major party political convention.

Because, in case you were wondering, there is no news here.

But there is plenty to see, to observe -- plenty of sketches to draw, snapshots to capture. There is no shortage of color. It’s news that’s in short supply.

Blogs are notorious for elevating the mundane. That’s the only way to survive a week like this one in Denver.

EAC voter registration database workshop webcast and report

This week the U.S. Election Assistance Commission held a workshop during its public meeting on statewide voter registration databases, featuring presentations by Minnesota Secretary of State Mark Ritchie and National Academy of Sciences chief scientist Herb Lin. Mr. Lin provided a summary of a report the National Academies is producing on voter registration databases, and Secretary of State Richie discussed how his state's voter registration database is working effectively to enable accurate voter registration.

California is in the process of developing a new statewide voter registration database, called VoteCal. Since California's database is among the last to be developed in the U.S., our state will benefit from learning from other state's successes and failures. A webcast of the EAC workshop is available online. The National Academies' interim report for the EAC on statewide voter registration databases is also available.

California Election Preview from CVF now online

CVF's web site now features an Election Preview for the November 4, 2008 Presidential election. CVF staff are working on a new California Online Voter Guide, which will debut in the Fall; in the meantime, the Election Preview features a list of the propositions on the ballot and links to key election information sites and resources.

Online voter registration bill moves forward

A bill to allow the Secretary of State to implement online voter registration, SB 381, is receiving bipartisan support in the Legislature according to an article by John Wildermuth in Wednesday's San Francisco Chronicle, featured below.

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Californians may soon be able to use their computers to register to vote and they can thank the state Department of Motor Vehicles for the chance.

The bill to allow online registration, SB381, co-authored by state Sen. Ron Calderon, D-Montebello, has rolled through the state Senate with few complaints and awaits final approval by the Assembly before going to Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger.

Arizona and Washington already have such systems, and online registrations there are surging. While would-be California voters now can fill out the voter registration form online from the secretary of state's Web site, they must print the form, sign it and mail it to their county election office.

Calderon's bill would computerize the entire process by allowing the secretary of state to replace the personal signature with the digitized signatures already online for people who have received California driver's licenses and identification cards.

Signatures that appear on the licenses and cards are as secure as those on voter registration cards, Calderon said, because Californians have to appear in person at the DMV, present a birth certificate or other identification, sign the application and have their photo and thumbprint taken.

"While there were some early security concerns, we eased them by requiring the driver's license number, date of birth and the last four digits of the Social Security number to be entered on the online registrations," the senator added.

The bill passed unanimously in the Assembly's election committee, with the support of two Republican members, while the Assembly appropriations committee approved it on an 11-4 vote along party lines.

"My main concern is that voting security is not tight enough as it is and allowing online registration won't help," said Assemblyman Doug La Malfa, R-Biggs (Butte County), who voted against the bill in committee. "We should set a high bar for people looking to vote and there are already a lot of fake IDs out there."

Calderon, chair of the Senate elections committee, came up with the bill after talking to Secretary of State Debra Bowen last year about ways to increase voter registration, which has held steady at about 70 percent of the state's eligible voters.

"This will help people registering close to the deadline or who are traveling or in the military," he said.

Bowen is supporting the bill, which she believes will especially appeal to young people who are accustomed to conducting much of their business online.

"Secretary Bowen believes this is the next logical step for voter registration," said Kate Folmar, a spokeswoman for the secretary. "You can file tax returns online, you can register your car online, so you should be able to register to vote online."

The programs in Arizona and Washington have had few, if any, problems. Arizona's EZ Vote system has been in use since 2002 and more than 70 percent of voter registrations are now done on the Internet.

Washington's Legislature approved online registration last year and the system went live in January. Already, 40 percent of new registrations are done online, said Katie Blinn, assistant director of elections in the Washington secretary of state's office.

"It's really been very popular here," she said. "Both voters and local election administrators like it because it's so much faster."

Despite complaints from some GOP legislators, the lack of organized opposition to California's online registration plan is surprising given concerns about the security of voting machines, ballot results and everything else connected with elections. Several states, including Arizona, already require identification from everyone showing up at the polls to cast a ballot.

But online voter registration is different from online voting and presents a much lower level of security concerns, said Kim Alexander, president of the nonpartisan California Voter Foundation.

"It's a different challenge, since voter registration cards aren't secret and ballots are," she said. "There are a lot of things about voting that don't work online, but voter registration is one thing that might."

Even if Calderon's bill sails through the Legislature and is signed by the governor, it's going to be awhile before it takes effect. The bill first requires that a new statewide voter registration database be operating, which isn't expected to happen until next year.

Robocalls violate state law according to CA PUC

Yesterday's San Jose Mercury News featured this story by Frank Davies reporting that the California Public Utilities Commission recently issued a ruling that political robocalls, which use computers to dial phones and play automated messages, violate the state's utility code. The California Voter Foundation routinely receives numerous complaints from voters about these automated calls. Up until this week I, and I expect many others in the political field, assumed these calls, while annoying, are protected under the First Amendment. Based on the news being reported, it looks like campaigns will have to alter their tactics in how they deliver such calls to voters. An excerpt from the Mercury News story is below.

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California's rules against robocalls are little-known and widely ignored. Susan Carothers of the PUC said Tuesday that commission staffers recently reviewed the code, which says such calls are legal only when introduced by a real person who asks for your consent to hear a recorded message. That rarely happens.

But enforcement is not easy. Consumers must first complain to their phone company, and if nothing is done, file a complaint with the PUC. Only two such complaints were filed with the PUC in the past two years, Carothers said.

That may change. An advocacy group, the National Political Do Not Contact Registry, is seeking complaints from California voters to present to phone carriers and the PUC.

"It's time that California voters are able to protect their privacy. Otherwise, campaigns will turn to robocalls, particularly in California, which has a very large and expensive media market," said Shaun Dakin, founder of the group.

In the February presidential primary, candidates for both parties used the get-out-the-vote calls. Actress Scarlett Johansson and comedian Chris Rock urged voters to back Obama, and Bill Clinton urged support for his wife.

Political consultants and operatives defend the calls as a low-cost alternative for candidates who don't have money for major TV and radio ad campaigns, but they concede that repeated calls at all hours can be counterproductive.

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Voters who wish to file complaints can access a PUC fact sheet or seek to be added to a registry of people who do not want automated calls at www.stoppoliticalcalls.org, which also features a California-specific complaint form. Voters can also contact their county election office and ask to have their phone numbers removed from their voter registration record.

The newly-redesigned California voter registration form is also likely to help cut down on unwanted political calls for new registrants, since the new form makes it clear to those filling it out that providing a phone number is optional.

New California voter registration form debuts

Secretary of State Debra Bowen announced yesterday that a newly redesigned California voter registration form is now available. I was one of several people who served on a working group to redesign the form. Together we came up with a number of improvements: the number of words on the card has been reduced from more than 1200 to about 730; the word "optional" has been added to the specific fields on the form that are optional (such as phone number and email address) rather than buried in instructions at the bottom of the page; there is no longer an instruction section - rather, instructions are included with the specific fields to be completed; and the political party selection section has been modified to make it clearer to voters how to register as a nonpartisan voter.

Scanned images of the new form and the old form are available on the Secretary of State's web site. Congratulations to Secretary of State Debra Bowen for taking the initiative on this process. I'm confident the new card will be easier and less intimidating to complete.