Make Government Work for You

State government working to preserve—if not grow—itself isn’t new, but the severity of the problem was laid bare by the pandemic as residents who needed government agencies lost faith in bureaucrats who went missing on key issues such as unemployment claims and dizzying school quarantine rules that kept kids out of the classroom and parents out of work. Republicans will demand that someone answer the phone when you call your government for help, reopening state agencies and buildings while also preventing the Executive Branch from encroaching on the duties required of state representatives and senators—your voices at the Capitol.

Transparency

• Require quasi-public agencies to abide by the same transparency and ethics standards as state agencies. (HB 5692)
• Require certain quasi-public agencies to competitively bid contracts while also making them subject to the oversight of the contracting standards board. (HB 5692)
• Require disclosures on campaign material or advertising that feature or quote anyone who is a registered lobbyist that they are a paid lobbyist who have a vested interest in the outcome of the election. (HB 5427)
• Increase the individual donations a statewide candidate for office can collect from an individual to $1,000 to make it easier to run against self-funded candidates. (HB 5312)
• Require “paid for by” campaign disclosures to be of sufficient contrast to be legible by the reader. (HB 5427)

Accountability

• Remove our state’s emission standards from California’s control and direction by adopting the federal standard. (HB 5277)
• Extend the bond lock to protect against excessive spending. (HB 5309)
• Protect the integrity of the new constitutional right to early voting by limiting early voting to the Saturday and Monday prior to election day and requiring in-person voting at town hall at times that are uniform statewide.
• Require Photo ID in order to vote and require Registrars of Voters to report incidents of voter fraud to the Secretary of the State. (HB 5425)
• Require that any legislation affecting election law, such early voting, be approved by a newly established bipartisan legislative commission on elections. (HB 5426)
• Merge the Appropriations and the Finance Revenue and Bonding Committees to create a Ways and Means Committee to craft a balanced and holistic budget more effectively.
• Expand the Accountability Subcommittee to include members of the Appropriations and Finance Committees who shall be required to meet and review the efficacy of agency programs and the dollars we spend on them.
• Require the committees of cognizance to review the State Auditor reports and require the state agencies to be more accountable for consistent failures and discrepancies.
• Require the State Auditors of Public Accounts to audit financially distressed municipalities that are under the purview of the Municipal Accountability Review Board (MARB). (HB 5346)
• Require legislative review of any debt service contracts between OPM and financially distressed municipalities. (HB 5346)
• Require the State Treasurer to direct excess state revenue to pay down bonded indebtedness in addition to pension debt obligations. (HB 5295)
• Update our civil preparedness and public health emergency statutes and executive order emergency powers to reflect modern realities and emerging threats, and to retain a legislative role in defining the duration of such powers. (HB 5311)
• Enable the legislature to fill PURA vacancies if the Governor fails to select a nominee within six months of the vacancy occurring. (HB 5407)
• Require each agency to have an internal policy to review whether public and customer service is satisfactory and timely and execute a plan to meet those expectations.
• Require the Department of Motor Vehicles to have a dedicated line for processing same day car dealer registrations. (HB 5371)