For Clients & Friends of The Gualco Group, Inc.
IN THIS ISSUE – “I don’t care how early you start. If you don’t have a message that resonates, it doesn’t matter.”
Mike Madrid, political consultant, on why CA Latinos aren’t voting
- Latino Vote Potential Remains Unrealized
- Reservoirs Full; Water Year Outlook is…Cloudy
- Shocker: State’s Electric Vehicle Fleet Needs to Grow
- California Farmers Need a New BFF in Congress
Capital News & Notes (CN&N) harvests California policy, legislative and regulatory insights from dozens of media and official sources for the past week. Please feel free to forward this unique client service.
FOR THE WEEK ENDING NOV. 17, 2023
Latino Vote Potential Remains Unrealized
CalMatters
Population-wise, the potential political power of Latinos in California seems unmatched.
They are the biggest racial and ethnic group, accounting for 40% of the state’s population.
California is also home to 8 million — or one quarter — of the nation’s eligible Latino voters, more than any other state, according to the Pew Research Center. And that number is growing due to young Latinos coming of age, increasing their share of the state’s eligible voting population.
But Latinos are significantly underrepresented in voter registration and turnout statewide and nationwide.
They made up just 14% of “frequent voters” (those who voted in at least five of the seven most recent elections), while white voters made up 71%, according to an August poll from the University of California Berkeley Institute of Government Studies.
Latinos also had the lowest turnout rate of all groups in the 2020 election statewide and nationwide, according to a 2022 analysis by the UCLA Latino Policy and Politics Institute.
Just 60% of eligible Latinos in California registered to vote, and just 55% of eligible Latinos voted, the data shows. They accounted for 32% of California’s eligible voters, but only 27% of those who voted that year.
Jovonna Renteria, a 26-year-old Latino voter in Tulare County, said working-class Latinos in her neighborhood prioritize their immediate needs — such as housing, food and childcare — over voting. Her mother works in a warehouse, and she is a first-generation college student majoring in social work.
“When people are so focused on just trying to survive, (voting) gets pushed to the side,” said Renteria, who is not related to Clarissa Renteria.
Latinos in California also tend to be younger, and more than half of the state’s population ages 24 and younger are Latinos, research shows. Nationwide, 34 million young Latinos will be qualified to vote next year.
But younger voters are less likely to participate, political experts say. They tend to be less affluent and motivated to vote not by habit, but by issues that matter to them, said Mark Baldassare, survey director at the Public Policy Institute of California.
Youths also have a lower “stake in society” since they are less likely to be parents or homeowners, who tend to be more invested in local politics such as property taxes or school bonds, Madrid said.
“If you don’t do that, you have a very transient mobile society, and that is a very civically disengaged one, which is not good for democracy,” he said.
Mateo Fernandez, 17, will be a first-time voter next year. While he is excited, the San Diego native said no one around him talked about voting until he was in eighth grade.
“A lot of people will tell you: ‘I just don’t know … how that works.’ Or they feel hopeless, like they have no power in what’s going on around them because everyone else seems so much more powerful,” he said.
Renteria saw the same in her community. She said Latinos feel “disenfranchised” and have “lost faith in the system” since they don’t see how they can benefit from those elections.
The feeling of disconnect is partly due to a historical and current lack of outreach from political campaigns, said Mindy Romero, founder and director of the Center for Inclusive Democracy and a political scientist who studies voting and underrepresentation among communities of color.
It’s a chicken-and-egg problem echoed in other states such as Texas: Latinos are less likely to vote because campaigns rarely reach out to them, but campaigns are less inclined to reach out to them because they focus on likely voters, Romero noted.
“We know that often in the Latino community … that you need to make the case and build trust and use trusted messengers,” she said. “We still don’t see candidates doing it, or at least not in a sustained way.”
But when campaigns do reach out, some rely on stereotypes about the Latino communities, holding events featuring mariachi bands, sprinkling in a few Spanish words and “parachuting” in and out, Romero said.
Presidential campaigns are also known to hold events at taco shops to rally the Latino vote, running the risk of what Barreto called “Hispandering.” Both Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden dined at King Taco — a famous Los Angeles joint — during their presidential bids.
“But there’s so much more to our community than that one particular taco shop in East L.A.,” Arana said.
The inconsistent outreach makes Latino voters feel ignored, said Jose Barrera, national vice president for the Far West at the League of United Latin American Citizens.
“Come every four years, it seems like everybody wants our vote,” he said. “But once elected, candidates seem to forget about us. …Why should we as a community support some people who really promise everything but never deliver?”
When asked by CalMatters how they have connected with Latino voters, the leading U.S. Senate candidates pointed to their outreach efforts, endorsements and track record.
Schiff and Porter have both met with Latino business owners and leaders in Southern California, the Central Valley and the Bay area, holding most events in San Francisco, Los Angeles, San Diego, Fresno or nearby areas, according to their campaigns.
Both Schiff’s and Porter’s campaigns pointed to their advocacy in Congress for a path to citizenship for undocumented immigrants, their fight against corporate interests and support for equitable health care.
Along with Lee — whose spokesperson did not respond to CalMatters’ inquiry for this story — they are all co-sponsors of the House version of the “Registry Act,” which would allow some undocumented immigrants to qualify for lawful status.
Schiff’s campaign highlighted his support for expanded child tax credits, affordable housing, clean energy and more as well as his role leading the first impeachment trial against former President Donald Trump. He also introduced the Head Start Expansion and Improvement Act, which would invest billions in providing services to children from low-income families.
Porter’s campaign also noted she pushed for more language assistance for non-English speaking voters and advocated for free COVID-19 testing for all. She was also the first Senate candidate to launch her campaign website in multiple languages including Spanish, her campaign said.
A spokesperson for Eric Early, a top GOP contender, said that Latino voters he spoke to want a lower cost of living, tougher regulations on violent crimes and a stop to “the indoctrination of our children in schools” and “the flood of illegal immigration and fentanyl across the southern border.” He also touted his lawsuit against the Santa Barbara Unified School District for diversity training, which was thrown out in federal court.
Candidates have met with Latino leaders, conducted listening tours in communities of color and visited Latino business owners around the state, some as early as February, according to the campaigns.
They have also been racking up endorsements from Latino leaders locally and nationally. On Nov. 4, the three top Democrats — Lee, Porter and Schiff — participated in a forum on immigration issues hosted by The Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights Action Fund.
But political experts say it requires much more to gain support from Latino voters: Early, consistent and aggressive campaign outreach, but more importantly, issues resonating enough to persuade Latinos to not only vote, but vote for them.
“Low voter turnout is almost as significant an indicator of a lack of appeal of a message as voting for another party,” said Mike Madrid, former political director for the California Republican Party and a political strategist with expertise on Latino voting.
“I don’t care how early you start. If you don’t have a message that resonates, it doesn’t matter.”
Additionally, campaigns must expand beyond immigration as a top issue, which is a “relic of the past,” Madrid said. A fast-growing portion of the electorate are U.S.-born Latinos who are not as motivated by the issue, and polls have shown that the economy, inflation and joblessness — not immigration — are consistently the top issue among Latinos, he said.
“How do you have the largest ethnic group in the state with the lowest voter turnout rates when they are telling you … that the No. 1 issue they have is jobs and the economy, and yet, all the Latino advocacy groups are talking about is immigration?”
The Nov. 4 forum was focused almost exclusively on immigration. Madrid argues that while the issue was important, it shouldn’t be all there is.
Population-wise, the potential political power of Latinos in California seems unmatched.
They are the biggest racial and ethnic group, accounting for 40% of the state’s population. California is also home to 8 million — or one quarter — of the nation’s eligible Latino voters, more than any other state, according to the Pew Research Center. And that number is growing due to young Latinos coming of age, increasing their share of the state’s eligible voting population.
But Latinos are significantly underrepresented in voter registration and turnout statewide and nationwide.
They made up just 14% of “frequent voters” (those who voted in at least five of the seven most recent elections), while white voters made up 71%, according to an August poll from the University of California Berkeley Institute of Government Studies.
Latinos also had the lowest turnout rate of all groups in the 2020 election statewide and nationwide, according to a 2022 analysis by the UCLA Latino Policy and Politics Institute. Just 60% of eligible Latinos in California registered to vote, and just 55% of eligible Latinos voted, the data shows. They accounted for 32% of California’s eligible voters, but only 27% of those who voted that year.
Why are Latinos less likely to vote?
One contributing factor: Latinos are disproportionately poorer, especially in California, Madrid noted.
More than half of Californians living in poverty are Latinos, according to data from the Public Policy Institute of California. Only 1 in 10 Latino households can afford a median-priced home in the state — a percentage lower than their white and Asian counterparts, according to the California Association of Realtors.
“When you have no upward economic mobility … that’s a very big problem for turnout,” Madrid said.
MORE:
Reservoirs Full; Water Year Outlook is…Cloudy
CalMatters
When state climatologist Michael Anderson looks into California’s water year ahead, he says the crystal ball is cloudy.
Threats of a major storm dissolved into showers in parts of California this week, with another surge of rainfall expected to wrap up this weekend. Rainfall is only expected to reach 1 to 2 inches statewide through Saturday morning, with light snowfall predicted in the Sierra Nevada mountains at higher elevations.
“Overall this is looking to be a beneficial rainfall event for Southern California, which is definitely welcome during the typical peak of our fire season,” the National Weather Service office for San Diego reported earlier this week.
Some headlines heralded it as the first storm of many as El Niño continues to strengthen and intensify. Characterized by warming of the central and eastern tropical Pacific Ocean, El Niño is often expected to bring wetter weather.
But in California, the connection is more tenuous. Of seven El Niño events over the past 23 years, Anderson said, two have been dry, three have been roughly average and two have been wet. One recent study reported that El Niño accounts for only about 25% of the year-to-year variability in California’s rain and snowfall during the winter.
“What that tells me is anything goes,” Anderson said. “El Niño by itself doesn’t define our water year.”
In fact, the year is actually off to a drier start: Statewide, California has seen only about 45% of average precipitation since this water year began Oct. 1.
Marty Ralph, director of the Center for Western Weather and Water Extremes at UC San Diego, suspects that it’s atmospheric rivers like the ones that pummeled California last year that will determine whether El Niño will bring a firehose or a trickle to California.
“It’s like you’re playing poker, and you’ve got a good hand — that’s El Niño for us. But we haven’t finished the round of the game, and we still have to draw a couple cards,” Ralph said. “But we might not draw the good cards.”
With seasonal outlooks unable to reliably say whether a winter will be wet or dry, water managers must plan for both.
Fortunately there’s some wiggle room this year, according to Jeanine Jones, the Department of Water Resources’ interstate resources manager. Last year’s massive snowpack and abundant rainfall filled the state’s reservoirs enough that even if this rainy season leans dry, she said, “We’re going into next year with a cushion, which is always good.”
The water that flows into rivers and streams and out to the ocean is often bemoaned as water wasted. But waste is in the eye of the beholder, said Jay Lund, vice-director of the Center for Watershed Sciences at UC Davis.
“Water that’s ‘wasted’ is always water used by somebody else,” Lund said.
The list of benefits for fishing, conservation, Delta farmers, water quality and healthy shorelines is lengthy. Water allowed to flow out into the San Francisco Bay, for instance, washes away salts and pollutants, transports sediment and sand necessary to maintain marshes and restore eroding beaches, assists salmon in migrations and helps maintain healthy ecosystems.
Still, the Public Policy Institute of California reports that California could have socked away more water last year, had there been better ways to ferry water from full rivers to groundwater recharge sites, and better coordination among landowners, local agencies, and others.
“I tend to think that there is room for capturing more surface water … if you could afford the cost of capturing it,” agreed Lund. “That, to me, is the biggest problem.”
The controversial Sites Reservoir project, for instance, is projected to cost more than $4.4 billion. The reservoir, planned in the western Sacramento Valley, would store as much as 1.5 million acre-feet of Sacramento River water, alarming environmental groups that say drawing more water from the river will imperil its already-struggling fish.
In the meantime, researchers like UC San Diego’s Ralph, along with local, state and federal agencies, hope to operate the state’s reservoirs more nimbly by incorporating new weather forecasting tools into decades-old rulebooks governing when to hold onto water and when to release it.
The program allowed the Russian River watershed to hold onto about 7,000 to 8,000 acre-feet more water in Lake Mendocino this past year, and an additional 19,000 acre-feet more in Lake Sonoma, according to Donald Seymour, deputy director of engineering with Sonoma Water. The Department of Water Resources announced that it is expanding the effort to two major reservoirs, Lake Oroville and New Bullards Bar, as well.
Many are looking down rather than up for opportunities to store more water. The Department of Water Resources estimates that about 3.8 million acre-feet of water was captured through groundwater recharge by last summer.
The Southern California water import giant, the Metropolitan Water District, also recently announced a $211 million groundwater bank in the Antelope Valley. The bank can store 280,000 acre-feet of water, enough to fill Castaic Lake, the largest State Water Project reservoir in Southern California. Though construction to allow withdrawals hasn’t been completed yet, the bank stands ready to accept deposits.
MORE:
Shocker: State’s Electric Vehicle Fleet Needs to Grow
Sacramento Bee
California has a long way to go before state workers are driving all-electric cars and trucks.
Last September, Gov. Gavin Newsom committed California’s state agencies to achieving net-zero greenhouse emissions by 2035. His signature on Senate Bill 1203 tasked the state’s Department of General Services with drawing up a plan for how to make that goal a reality.
Naturally, the state’s fleet of 35,702 vehicles was a prime target for decarbonization. But the transition won’t happen overnight.
According to agency data obtained through a Public Records Act request, California owns a total of 2,335 zero-emissions vehicles, which include electric, fuel cell and plug-in hybrid models. Eighty of those vehicles were purchased in 2023, and departments bought nearly 500 in 2022.
Still, zero-emissions vehicles make up only a small fraction of the state’s vehicles, which include everything from golf carts and sedans to big rigs and school buses. More than 93% of the state fleet still emits greenhouse gases to some extent (close to 87% of state vehicles are internal combustion engines, and 6% are hybrids).
The state bought more than 4,250 vehicles last fiscal year. The year before, departments acquired nearly 6,800. Fiscal year 2020-21 saw California purchase about 1,350 new autos for its fleet.
Teslas are ubiquitous on California’s roads, and a fraction of them are state-owned.
The DGS data shows 554 Teslas in California’s active vehicle fleet. All of them are Model 3s, and the vast majority are the 2023 vintage. Most of the cars were purchased in 2022.
Caltrans owns the most Teslas of any department, with 399. The department owns by far the most vehicles of any state agency with more than 9,600.
Trailing behind are the Department of Food and Agriculture with 40 Teslas, the Department of Public Health with 30 and the Department of Social Services with 18.
According to the State Administrative Manual, departments are advised to replace their vehicles when they’ve hit a certain mileage or age threshold, whichever comes first.
Law enforcement vehicles should be replaced after the lesser of five years or 100,000 miles.
Sedans can go for six years, but only 65,000 miles. Minivans, on the other hand, are good for eight years or 80,000 miles.
When vehicles are ready to be retired, the state often sells them. Departments sold close to 1,900 vehicles during the last fiscal year. The year before, that number was just under 2,000. In fiscal year 2020-21, the state sold about 1,000 vehicles.
California Farmers Need a New BFF in Congress
Politico
California farmers have a problem.
In the span of months, they’ve lost the seniority of two of California’s most effective champions for agriculture — first came the death of Sen. Dianne Feinstein, a staunch Democratic ally who was unafraid of prioritizing farms over endangered fish. Then Republicans kicked Rep. Kevin McCarthy, a native of the Central Valley’s agricultural heartland, out of the House speakership.
“It’s clearly going to be a vacuum for a while,” said Cannon Michael, a melon and tomato farmer. Michael also chairs the San Luis & Delta Mendota Water Authority, which supplies water to 1.2 million acres of irrigated farmland in the Valley.
The loss of congressional leadership is putting the industry at risk of losing funding and access to water. The risk is amplified as negotiations over access to the Colorado River heat up and intensifying drought and wet years test the state’s aging, oversubscribed water delivery system.
In retrospect, over-reliance on Feinstein was a mistake and led to weaker relationships with other potential allies, Michael said. The industry will now need both senators, he said: “It’s going to be a vastly different senatorial kind of positioning.”
California also lost Feinstein’s spot on the all-important Senate Appropriations Committee, from where she helped funnel money to the state’s water infrastructure.
“It is a concern to everybody who’s in the state,” said former Rep. Dennis Cardoza, a Central Valley Democrat who now represents agricultural lobbying clients. “Transitions are always like this. They’re difficult.”
Industry insiders say they’ve seen Sen. Alex Padilla, now the state’s senior senator, taking on a more active role on water, including as a recent appointee to the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee. But they’re still waiting to see what he might deliver.
No serious candidate vying to replace Feinstein has made a bid to represent agriculture in the same way she did. The three frontrunners, Democratic Reps. Katie Porter, Adam Schiff and Barbara Lee, are all from urban areas and lack strong ties either to agriculture or the Central Valley.
Cardoza, who has endorsed Schiff in the 2024 race, said his advice to politicians seeking ag’s purple electorate and deep donor pockets is to spend time in the Central Valley.
Meanwhile, people in ag are getting ready to re-up their pitch to up-and-coming pols, whom they acknowledge will most likely lean increasingly more to the left even as many food-producing regions trend conservative.
“We live in an era where I’m not sure that a person like Senator Feinstein could be elected,” said Tom Birmingham, the former general manager of the Westlands Water District.