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Cecille Isidro — Tue, 18 Aug 2009 02:13:00 -0400

According to New America Foundation, 38% of all households are in a state of asset poverty, in that they lack liquid financial resources to support their ...

Bye Bye to “Once upon a Time?” ... | San Francisco Examiner

Cecille Isidro — Mon, 06 Jul 2009 06:08:00 -0400

The study is among the first to use small recording devices to capture sounds and words spoken to and around young children, according to New America Foundation’s Early Ed Watch blog. The gadgets are put in kids' pockets or attached to their clothing. Researchers report that the technology supported by the LENA (Language Environment Analysis) Foundation, is breaking new ground in the collection of data on children's natural environments.

Can California Import a British Plan?

Cecille Isidro — Tue, 01 Aug 2006 00:56:00 -0400

Prime Minister Tony Blair swings through California next week to enjoy some down time with Governor Schwarzenegger and First Lady Maria Shriver. No doubt he’ll want to take a break from a string of bad press in the U.K. Let’s hope he and the Governor find time to talk about one of his quiet but groundbreaking successes that holds great promise for California -- Blair’s new program to give every child a stake in Great Britain’s economic future.

Each British baby born after September 1st, 2002 receives a "Child Trust Fund" of 250 pounds (about $460) with the poorest one-third of kids receiving twice that. The government will make similar "top-up" deposits at age seven. Parents, relatives, and others can contribute up to 1,200 pounds tax-free every year. With the magic of compound interest and ongoing contributions, the account could grow to 9,000 pounds-about $17,000-when it matures on the child’s 18th birthday. So far, almost 2 million accounts have been opened.

The idea is to give all kids -- regardless of their backgrounds -- a shot at economic success, to reduce their reliance on the state, and to foster a savings culture in the U.K.

Time, of course, will tell if the Child Trust Fund can deliver all this. What’s amazing is that the program is already spurring significant savings -- even in poor families. Moreover, the accounts are serving as "magnets" for contributions: The head of Children’s Mutual, one of the main providers of the accounts in the U.K., tells the story of a Child Trust Fund voucher that came back with 30 baptism checks attached to it.

Blair launched the Child Trust Fund to address challenges that are remarkably similar to those facing California. British parents worry deeply about how their children will ever afford to buy a home-the average age of a first time home buyer is 34-and how they can help their kids pay for college. One in five British students has debts of $27,000.

If young adults have their own assets at 18, instead of draining their parents’, these problems may well be solved. Small amounts saved regularly over a long period of time can turn into meaningful, sometimes life changing amounts -- giving kids opportunities, choices, and hope they otherwise may not have.

Goodness knows California -- indeed the U.S. -- could use its own version of the Child Trust Fund. In California some 7.8 million California households, or 29 percent of the state’s population, would only last three months at the poverty level if they were forced to deplete all of their assets. That’s the fourth worst "asset poverty" rate in the nation and more than twice California’s "official" poverty rate of 12 percent. Furthermore, California has the lowest homeownership rate in the country, only 39 percent of California workers have access to a retirement plan through their employer, and 28% of Californians don’t even own a bank account.

How could this work in California? The state could establish a California Kids Account for each of the 540,000 kids born in California every year with a one-time, $300 deposit. After-tax contributions, up to $1,000 a year, would be permitted while encouraging families to direct their state and federal tax refunds -- especially generous Earned Income Tax Credit refunds and Child Tax Credit refunds -- directly into the accounts. The accounts would build up tax-free. Assuming low-income families managed to save or leverage just $50 per month, this small investment would grow to nearly $19,000 when the child turns 18-enough to comfortably cover the first three years of tuition and fees at a public university in California. If the child does not use the account for college, it grows to $34,000 by age 30 and $185,000 by age 65.

Unlike Mr. Blair’s accounts, which can be spent on anything at age 18, California Kids Accounts could be used only for post-secondary education and training, a down-payment on a first home, or rolled over into a retirement savings account. If the account is used any other way, the at-birth deposit must be returned to the state, along with penalties and taxes. The accounts also provide a perfect catalyst to build the financial literacy of all young Californians and their parents -- and it’s already doing exactly that in the U.K. At $160 million a year, this relatively small investment -- it’s less than three-tenths of one percent of the state’s $100 billion budget -- would be transformative.

It doesn’t take an army of economists to know that California would reap huge rewards with more owners, savers, taxpayers and entrepreneurs -- and fewer people depending on the state, their communities, and their parents for their livelihood and well-being. No doubt Tony Blair knows this all quite well, as do Senators as diverse as Rick Santorum and Hillary Clinton, each of whom has recently proposed progressively funded investment accounts for all newborns. Hopefully, perhaps after a walk together down one of California’s lovely beaches, Governor Schwarzenegger will come to know this as well.

Real Solutions Needed for Small Businesses

Cecille Isidro — Wed, 17 May 2006 16:20:01 -0400

The United States Senate is embroiled in a debate over SB 1955, a bill that purports to help small businesses purchase health insurance. Offered by Sen. Mike Enzi, R-Wyo., the dialogue on finding solutions for small businesses is critical.

While most Americans (61 percent) obtain health insurance from employers, this is true for just over half of Californians. Small businesses are California's economic engine, and yet, higher premiums and administrative barriers make it much more difficult for small businesses to purchase insurance. California insurance premiums have increased 60 percent between 2000 and 2004, and small businesses have seen even higher increases. The lack of employers offering insurance helps push California to No. 6 nationally in the percent of uninsured residents, with a whopping 21 percent lacking coverage.

As a result, SB 1955's concepts of "simplification" and "harmonization" sound appealing. But, the pro-business rhetoric doesn't match the bill's anti-business impact on California.

In the name of "simplifying" the system, the federal legislation would preempt existing California laws -- laws that keep premiums down. Right now, state law holds small business insurance rates within a certain range, regardless of employee health.

California small businesses with older employees and those with even one chronically ill person are certain to be hit with higher costs under SB 1955. And California's smallest firms -- including those with young, healthy employees -- would see higher costs, because protective rules would be gone. Even the Congressional Budget Office, the nonpartisan research arm for Congress, has said that SB 1955 will increase many businesses' premiums.

And in the name of "harmonization," SB 1955 eliminates California rules requiring that certain health benefits be offered by all insurers. But many of our requirements are for preventative services that both help people and keep costs down -- benefits such as mammograms, diabetes care and child vaccinations that insurers don't always cover. If harmonization means losing these protections, then California should be allowed to go its own way.

Small business deserves real solutions to the health crisis. The good news is that SB 1955 recently suffered a negative procedural vote in the Senate. The politicians should first do no harm and drop the bill entirely. Then, we in California need to enact bipartisan, commonsense solutions that can bring down health care costs, such as:

Promoting electronic medical records. Health care record-keeping is done today pretty much as it was 50 years ago -- with paper and pen. This leads to unnecessary costs and to poor care because doctors don't have the information they need. Electronic medical records will be more efficient and complete. That's why we need to continue the bipartisan work in the California Legislature by Sens. Elaine Alquist, D-Santa Clara, and Abel Maldonado, R-Santa Maria. This promising bill would give tax credits to physician offices for health technology investments.
Fighting obesity. Obesity adds tens of billions to California health care costs by increasing the rates of diabetes and other chronic disease. And children have some of the fastest growing obesity rates. To address this, state Sen. Tom Torlakson, D-Antioch, has sponsored needed legislation promoting physical education in school. Governor Schwarzenegger has also already taken steps to combat obesity. Both efforts should be supported.
Promoting pay-for-performance. Any small-business owner will tell you that accountability is critical for success. But too many health insurers fail to evaluate what they are buying. A revolutionary idea would be for Medi-Cal to set quality benchmarks for care purchased. As the state's primary health insurance program for low-income residents, with more than $30 billion in annual spending, Medi-Cal has a commanding marketplace position that would allow it to pioneer quality care -- clearly a bipartisan goal.

These ideas will start to bring down health care costs for all employers and won't engender the kinds of bitter political battles we have seen around SB 1955. It's time to stop making health care into a political football and instead to start making progress for small businesses and their employees.

Ranked Voting: Less Money, More Turnout

Cecille Isidro — Mon, 06 Feb 2006 03:00:00 -0500

Several recent studies show that the introduction of ranked-choice voting in San Francisco is off to a good start. The shift from December runoffs to RCV has saved millions of taxpayer dollars, and voter participation was much higher and more inclusive than would be expected using the old runoff system. The voters themselves, when polled, overwhelmingly preferred RCV to the old December runoff system.

In RCV, voters rank up to three candidates. If no candidate wins a majority of first rankings, the candidate with the fewest first rankings is eliminated. Voters who ranked this candidate now have their vote counted for their second choice, and all ballots are recounted in an "instant runoff." If a candidate reaches a majority, she or he wins. If not, the process repeats until a candidate wins a majority of votes. By using RCV, we elect majority winners in a single election.

We can understand the impact of RCV by making a before-and-after comparison of two recent elections:

In December 2001, San Francisco paid approximately $3 million to hold a runoff election in which 70,000 voters, only 17 percent of those registered, turned out to elect the city attorney.

In November 2005, approximately 200,000 registered voters turned out to vote for city attorney, treasurer, assessor-recorder and various ballot propositions. Thanks to RCV, there was no need to hold a December runoff for assessor-recorder, the only race that did not produce a majority winner in November.

Instead, the "instant runoff" system was activated, resulting in Phil Ting being elected as the majority winner in a single election. Two hundred thousand voters cast a first-choice ballot, and a full 190,000 of them [95 percent] saw their ballots count in the decisive instant runoff round. That means 120,000 more voters decided the contest between Ting and second-place Gerardo Sandoval than likely would have turned out in a December runoff. That's nearly a tripling in voter turnout, and taxpayers saved $3 million by not paying for a second election.

All San Francisco neighborhoods benefited from this boost in voter turnout, but the six neighborhoods benefiting most had the highest concentrations of racial minorities. The estimated increase in voter turnout for these six neighborhoods over the December runoff baseline ranged from 210 percent in Western Addition to 307 percent in Visitation Valley, with Bayview-Hunters Point, the Mission, the Ingleside and the Excelsior-Outer Mission in between. Together, these six neighborhoods had more than 35,000 additional voters casting a vote in the decisive round than likely would have done so in a December runoff -- showing how RCV can produce a more racially diverse electorate.

Finally, we now know what the voters themselves think about RCV. San Francisco State University conducted an exit poll of voters in the November 2004 elections. The poll showed 86 percent of voters reported they understood the RCV system. And 68 percent of those who had used both systems said they preferred the new RCV to the old December runoffs, with only 12 percent saying the opposite.

Important differences were observed across racial groups. Whites, Asians, English speakers and Chinese speakers all said they understood RCV and preferred it to the old system at the same high rates. Latinos, blacks and Spanish-speakers were somewhat less enthusiastic but still preferred RCV to the old December runoff.

Based on the evidence, San Francisco has made the transition from December runoffs to RCV with remarkable success. Still, education should continue with a focus on voters who have adapted more slowly, investing into a continuing public education campaign some of the millions of dollars saved each year by not holding a December runoff.

Battle Royal Brewing Over Redistricting

Cecille Isidro — Tue, 19 Apr 2005 00:00:00 -0400

In California, a political volcano is smoldering that is unusual for this time of the decade. Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, a Republican, has launched an effort for a mid-decade redistricting by a panel of judges, taking the line-drawing of legislative districts out of the hands of the Democratic-dominated legislature.

Democrats are calling the governor's actions a power grab, like GOP firebrand Tom DeLay's re-redistricting scheme in Texas. Schwarzenegger has responded by saying he will call a special election for November 2005 to let the voters decide. The volcano is building up steam and looks set to blow.

Yet at the end of the day it all may amount to a tempest in a teapot. When most nonpartisan experts in California are asked what impact a redistricting commission will have on state politics, the near-unanimous response is: not much. Gradual changes in the California political map have weakened the ability of the line-drawers to affect outcomes.

Over the last 10 to 15 years there has been a dramatic shift in regional partisan demographics, not only in California but in other states as well. Red/Republican versus blue/Democrat demographics have become balkanized along regional lines, with many states having their own red versus blue patterns within their state.

In California, liberal voters and Democrats dominate the coastal areas and cities, while conservative voters and Republicans dominate the interior areas. The only way to make California's districts more competitive is to use the Democratic cities as the hubs of a wheel, and draw the districts as spokes radiating outward into the more Republican interior. Districts would have to start in San Francisco and extend across the bay into Contra Costa County, or start in downtown Los Angeles and extend eastward into Riverside County. Or districts would have to be narrow east-west bands up and down the state, creating what has been called the "coral snakeamander" plan.

But that plan would look ridiculous, and also would undermine the ability of "communities of interest" such as racial minorities to elect their representative, leading to legal challenges.

Most analysts have not yet caught up with this paradigm shift. They are still thinking about politics the way we used to, without acknowledging the dramatic shift in the regional partisan demographics that has occurred in California. But these are the stark dilemmas that face redistricting practitioners and that will thwart attempts by a California redistricting commission to create more competitive races.

Other states already use redistricting commissions, and the results have not been promising because of the same sort of urban/rural splits. In Iowa, long considered the "poster child" for the effectiveness of redistricting commissions, all Congressional incumbents easily won reelection in 2004, and in the state legislature most seats were won by huge landslide margins with only four seats out of 100 considered tight. Arizona, Washington and other states using redistricting commissions have had similarly disappointing results.

That is not to say that there are not still some states where partisan gerrymanders have not unfairly tilted the playing field. The Republican gerrymander in Florida, for instance, has given the GOP 18 out of 25 congressional seats even though the statewide votes of Democrats and Republicans are about even. But in states like California, Washington and others, partisan regional demographics are trumping the hands of the line-drawers.

In short, California and other states find themselves in a situation where the problem is not who draws the legislative lines, it's where people live. Our current politics are about as good as they are going to get as long as we continue to use an antiquated single-seat district, winner-take-all electoral system that is so ill-suited for the new California and its wide range of attitudes, demographics and geographic regions. New approaches are needed.

To promote more competitive races and give bipartisan representation to all parts of the state, California should adopt a non-winner-take-all voting system like that used in Peoria, Illinois for municipal elections. Instead of electing 80 state representatives from 80 districts, voters in 16 districts would elect five representatives each. Any candidate who won at least a sixth of the vote would earn a seat. These five-seat districts would see more bipartisan competition, even electing some urban Republicans and rural Democrats. Occasionally an independent candidate or a third-party candidate might win a seat, really opening up California democracy and giving voters more choice. More competition would foster greater accountability.

If Governor Schwarzenegger and other reformers are serious about transforming California politics, that's the plan they should promote. The political map has shifted, and reformers need to adjust accordingly.

How to Get Clean, Complete Voter Rolls

Cecille Isidro — Mon, 21 Mar 2005 00:00:00 -0500

Our country's strength flows from its willingness to innovate and improve upon the American experiment in democracy. Recent presidential elections underscore the importance of revamping the way we register citizens to vote.

Currently, there are two widespread failures. First, our voter rolls are not clean. That leads to uncertainty about voter fraud, such as people voting in two states and, in some places, like Alaska, having more registered voters than adults. Second, our voter rolls are not complete, with nearly a third of eligible voters-about 60 million Americans-not registered to vote. It's time to establish clean and complete voter rolls to preserve the integrity of elections and keep close elections in the hands of voters-rather than judges.

Having so many unregistered citizens hurts voter turnout and causes great problems in elections. Under current laws, we naturally see major voter registration drives during election years. The result is a surge of registrations right before an election, leading to long lines at polling places, voters not receiving information about where to vote and turmoil over provisional and absentee ballots.

It all-too-easily leads to potential partisan fraud, such as a Republican-linked voter registration firm in Nevada allegedly throwing out forms collected from voters registering as Democrats, and accusations of Democratic urban machines registering dead people to vote in cities like Milwaukee and Chicago. The inevitable result is judges getting involved in deciding close elections.

Pointing fingers and name-calling won't help fix the problem. The way forward is to set a goal of 100 percent voter registration by establishing registration as a mutual responsibility of citizens and their government. It's the best way to bring together conservatives concerned about fraud in elections and liberals concerned about low voter registration. We need a coherent system that ensures all of us can vote, but none of us can vote more than once.

The United States in fact is one of the few democracies where the government does not take responsibility for registering its voters, which is why Iraq already has a higher share of its adult citizens registered to vote than the United States. The international norm is an orderly process of automatic voter registration of every citizen who reaches voting age. Because the government takes a proactive, ongoing role, registration occurs on a steady, rolling basis instead of in spurts tied to any specific election. Voters receive a unique identifier that ensures they don't vote more than once.

Not only does such an orderly process provide nearly 100 percent voter registration, but it leads to much cleaner voter rolls and less voter fraud. With comprehensive databases and full registration, there is no longer a question about who is or is not registered. Everyone is registered.

By 2006, each state is supposed to have its federally-mandated statewide voter registration database in place, which, if merged with each state's Census database, would take us a giant step toward universal registration. The most comprehensive way, however, would be to establish a national database and federal standards for assuring 100 percent registration of eligible voters.

But in the short term, there are immediate easier steps states and localities can take. We can focus on the population that typically has the lowest rates of registration: young people. A state or county could have high schools pre-register to vote all their students as they enter their junior year. Alternatively, a state's Department of Motor Vehicles could pre-register all those under 18 as they obtain their learner's permits.

Once these pre-registrants turn 18, their registrations automatically would become active. They would receive a letter alerting them about their eligibility to vote, the date of the next election and their responsibilities when changing addresses.

Such changes would register far more young people in an orderly way and generate more understanding of the value of 100 percent registration. It would provide a means to introduce more young people to the importance of civic engagement because a natural complement to this policy would be a "voter's ed" curriculum for high schoolers-just as many have "driver's ed" now. Over time, as all 18-year-olds were registered to vote, the United States would move far closer to 100 percent voter registration.

Legislators in states like Illinois and Rhode Island are preparing legislation for such pre-registration. As we promise to export democracy abroad, let's take care of business at home. Policymakers should establish a clear goal: clean and complete voter rolls by the next presidential election in 2008.