PRESS ENTERPRISE EDITORIAL: If meters are broken, don’t fine motorists

I'm excited to have the support of the Press Enterprise in my efforts to end ticketing at broken parking meters.

THE PRESS-ENTERPRISE July 08, 2013; 05:27 PM

California drivers should not face fines for parking conditions outside of their control. Gov. Jerry Brown should sign a bill that strengthens a ban on fines for parking in spaces with broken parking meters. Local government should keep meters in good repair, not use broken meters as a way to pry more money out of unwary drivers.

The Senate last week approved AB 61, by Assemblyman Mike Gatto, D-Los Angeles, sending the bill to the governor. This legislation would for three years prohibit local fines for parking beside a broken meter. Current state law bars cities and counties from levying fines for parking at defective meters, but also allows local governments to opt out and apply different rules. Some cities, most notably Los Angeles, have enacted ordinances that fine drivers who park at broken meters — though how many jurisdictions have their own rules is not clear.

But there is nothing fair about fining drivers who cannot pay for parking because of a malfunctioning meter. Such charges make parking needlessly annoying for drivers, especially in areas with limited parking space. Motorists either have to waste time driving around in search of another spot, or park by a broken meter and risk a fine. Businesses also worry that busted meters in front of their stores or offices can complicate customer parking — and potentially drive away commerce. Fining drivers because government equipment has malfunctioned is hardly a welcoming gesture.

Such fines also create a perverse incentive for government to move slowly on fixing meters. Cities and counties can rake in more money from parking fines than from parking fees. Parking at a metered space costs at most a few dollars, but fines can be much more expensive: Los Angeles’ fine for using a space with a broken meter, for example, runs upward of $60. Los Angeles officials said last year that lifting the fine for broken meters would “cost” the city up to $5 million a year.

AB 61, however, would give local government a powerful reason to keep parking meters in working order.
Meanwhile, those who parked next to busted meters for longer than the posted time limit would still face fines. A meter malfunction should not provide a free pass to hold a spot indefinitely.

Local governments claim that if the state precludes fines for parking next to broken meters, people will vandalize the devices to avoid parking fees. But there is little evidence to support that contention, and meter sabotage does not seem to be an issue for cities that do not levy such fines now. Besides, the penalty for vandalism carries a base fine of up to $1,000, a far steeper cost than simply paying to park. And AB 61 would sunset in three years, time enough to gather evidence on whether meter vandalism is a valid concern.
At the same time, AB 61 would create more uniform parking rules in a state with a mobile population, and end the practice of punishing drivers for malfunctioning meters. The bill offers an approach that is fairer and more sensible than a patchwork of local meter rules, and the governor should sign it.

You can read more at http://www.pe.com/opinion/editorials-headlines/20130708-editorial-if-meters-are-broken-dont-fine-motorists.ece

Mike Gatto is the Chairman of the Appropriations Committee in the California State Assembly.  He represents Burbank, Glendale, La Cañada Flintridge, La Crescenta, Montrose, and the Los Angeles neighborhoods of Atwater Village, East Hollywood, Franklin Hills, Hollywood Hills, Los Feliz, and Silver Lake.  www.asm.ca.gov/gatto 

PRESS ENTERPRISE EDITORIAL: Open car pool lanes during non-peak hours

Published: June 09, 2013; 06:00 PM | California does not have so much freeway capacity that the state can afford to leave some lanes mostly empty for much of the day. The state Senate should back a bill that would open some car pool lanes in Los Angeles County to regular traffic during non-rush hours. And the Legislature should extend that approach to other Southern California counties, as well.

The Assembly last month passed AB 405, by Assemblyman Mike Gatto, D-Los Angeles, by a 72-0 vote. The bill would allow regular traffic to use car pool lanes on portions of Highway 134 and Interstate 210 during non-peak hours. Gatto structured the bill as a pilot project, but he clearly wants to extend the same approach to other freeways in Southern California.

The idea is attractive to a car-clogged region that routinely faces frustrating traffic congestion. California now has 1,428 miles of car pool lanes out of about 12,000 miles of freeway in the state, with plans for adding 777 more miles of the restricted-use lanes. But single-occupant vehicles dominate Southern California traffic, leaving the restricted lanes largely useless to most drivers. Adding new freeway lanes in heavily developed Southern California is both difficult and expensive, so the region needs to make the most efficient use of existing freeway capacity.

Inland residents, for example, welcome additional lanes for the crowded Highway 91/Interstate 215 route between Riverside and San Bernardino. But leaving those lanes off limits to most drivers 24 hours a day stands to annoy motorists more than ease traffic. All taxpayers are paying for stretches of roadway that only some drivers can use, because sharing rides is not a simple matter for many people in Southern California’s sprawling commuter culture.

California already has a precedent for opening the lanes to all traffic for part of the day: Northern California car pool lanes have restrictions only during peak traffic hours Monday through Friday. The rest of the time, all drivers can use the lanes.

Caltrans, however, says that traffic patterns make that approach infeasible for Southern California, because daily freeway congestion lasts longer. But that claim hardly justifies keeping the lanes off-limits to other traffic 24 hours a day. And the car pool lanes do have room for general use: A 2012 Caltrans report showed that some of the restricted-use lanes in Los Angeles County barely met Caltrans’ minimum standard for car pool lanes of 800 vehicles per hour, even at peak times. And those counts can see a substantial drop after rush hour periods.

Car pool lanes are supposed to decrease traffic congestion and improve air quality. But the lanes do nothing to serve those goals if they remain mostly empty while the rest of the freeway is jammed. Such instances only irritate motorists and undermine public support for the restricted-use lanes.

Opening the lanes to all during nonpeak times would promote more efficient use of freeway space while lowering drivers’ frustration level. Transportation policy needs to be practical, and leaving some freeway lanes largely empty for part of the day falls far short of that mark.

You can read this editorial and more at the Riverside Press Enterprise by clicking HERE

Mike Gatto is the Chairman of the Appropriations Committee of the California State Assembly.  He represents the cities of Burbank, Glendale, La Cañada Flintridge, the Los Angeles neighborhoods of Los Feliz, Silver Lake, Atwater Village, and portions of the Hollywood Hills and East Hollywood.  www.asm.ca.gov/gatto

Press Enterprise Editorial: End the legal shakedowns over chemical warnings

Legislators should back a bill that would curb abusive lawsuits over warnings about harmful chemicals. Businesses would have the chance to correct violations promptly, and avoid lawsuits and fines.  Photo: The Press Enterprise

THE PRESS-ENTERPRISE - March 14, 2013; 05:47 PM

California should not confuse bounty hunting with consumer protection. Predatory legal shakedowns under Prop. 65 burden businesses while doing nothing to safeguard the public. Legislators should back a bill that would curb abuses while ensuring compliance with the law.

Assemblyman Mike Gatto, D-Los Angeles, has a sensible proposal that would protect the goals of Prop. 65 while combating abusive lawsuits. His AB 227 would give businesses that receive notice of a Prop. 65 violation 14 days to correct the issue — and thus avoid costly lawsuits and fines of up to $2,500 per day.

Prop. 65, approved by voters in 1986, requires businesses to notify customers about harmful chemicals in the products they purchase. The state maintains a list of more than 800 chemicals that compel the warning notices, ranging from well-known health threats such as lead and asbestos to obscure chemicals such as dibromoacetonitrile, a byproduct of drinking water disinfection. Many prescription drugs are on the list, which also includes such commonplace items as diesel exhaust, tobacco smoke and unleaded gasoline.

But the measure allows enforcement through private lawsuits, leading to a thriving practice of threatening unsuspecting businesses with fines and litigation unless they agree to a settlement. Businesses can easily run afoul of Prop. 65, given the broad range of chemicals involved. Some are common ingredients in manufactured products, while others — such as diesel exhaust — are nearly inescapable in populated areas.

The legal threats do little besides earning money for lawyers and adding to the already high cost of doing business in California. The violations usually consist of failure to post proper warnings about hazardous chemicals, rather than any immediate hazard to public health. And Prop. 65 notices are so ubiquitous that most people pay little attention, anyway.

The lack of a proper posted warning, however, can cost big money. The state attorney general’s office reports than in 2011, Prop. 65 lawsuits led to settlements totaling $16.3 million. Nearly three-quarters of that amount, almost $12 million, went to attorneys’ fees — and not fines or corrective actions.

But voters did not approve Prop. 65 with the idea of making attorneys wealthy. Allowing businesses to correct violations instead of saddling them with huge payouts advances the goal of the measure — without also harming the state’s economy.

The Legislature has a ready precedent for this approach: Last year, legislators approved a bill that protected businesses from abusive lawsuits under the Americans with Disabilities Act, by cutting any potential damages if businesses correct violations promptly.

Likewise, AB 227 would refocus Prop. 65 enforcement on compliance, rather than on exploiting trivial violations for monetary gain. That approach serves the public’s interest in both environmental safety and economic progress. Californians’ desire to know about the presence of hazardous chemicals does not justify the bane of excessive, greedy litigation.

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This editorial can be read in its entirety at the Press Enterprise, by clicking HERE

Mike Gatto is the chairman of the Appropriations Committee of the California State Assembly. He represents Burbank, Glendale, La Cañada-Flintridge, La Crescenta, Montrose, and the Los Angeles neighborhoods of Los Feliz, Silver Lake, Atwater Village, and portions of the Hollywood Hills and East Hollywood.   www.asm.ca.gov/gatto

PRESS ENTERPRISE EDITORIAL: During nonpeak hours, open car pool lanes to all

The Legislature should support efforts to open car pool lanes to all vehicles at off-peak
travel times to improve traffic flow. - See more HERE

THE PRESS-ENTERPRISE - Car-clogged California needs every bit of efficiency the state can squeeze from freeways. So legislators should back a push to open car pool lanes to general traffic during non-rush hours. The state does not have so much freeway capacity that it can afford to leave lanes mostly empty for long stretches each day.

Assemblyman Mike Gatto, D-Los Angeles, last week introduced AB 405. The bill would open a five-mile stretch of car pool lanes on Highway 134 to regular traffic during off-peak travel hours. Currently, only vehicles with two or more occupants can use the lanes, regardless of the time of day. The assemblyman notes that the goal of car pool lanes is to ease traffic congestion and improve air quality. But letting lanes sit empty while bumper-to-bumper traffic jams the rest of the freeway just irritates motorists, without serving any policy purpose.

Gatto crafted the proposal as a pilot program, but clearly envisions extending the same approach to freeways across Southern California. He has the right idea: Letting solo drivers use car pool lanes during off-peak hours is a cost-effective way to increase freeway capacity — cheaper certainly than spending billions of dollars to add additional lanes. The state now has more than 1,400 miles of car pool lanes, out of about 12,000 miles of freeway in the state.

The evidence supports the assemblyman’s proposal. A 2012 Caltrans report about such “high-occupancy vehicle” lanes in the Los Angeles area suggests the lanes underperform. An average of 1,300 vehicles per hour used the lanes during rush hour times in 2011. Caltrans puts a limit of 1,650 vehicles per hour as the maximum traffic level for such lanes, so the car pool lanes are hardly filled to capacity. Some of the car pool lanes barely met Caltrans’ minimum standard of 800 vehicles per hour. And those numbers were for peak times. Traffic in those lanes would be even less during off hours — hardly an efficient use of existing freeway space.

That result is not an anomaly. A 2007 report by the Institute for Transportation Studies at UC Berkeley found similar underuse of California’s car pool lanes — and suggested that opening the lanes to all traffic at some times of the day would improve freeway operations.

California already has a precedent for doing so. In Northern California, the car pool restrictions only apply during morning and evening rush hour periods Monday through Friday. The rest of the time, anyone can use the lanes.

Caltrans says that following a similar approach in Southern California would be impractical, because the daily freeway congestion lasts longer. But that contention merely means less time might be available for all-purpose use of the lanes, and is not a persuasive reason for keeping restrictions in place 24 hours a day. And nothing undercuts public support for car pool lanes like being stuck in traffic while a restricted lane sits empty.

Expanding freeways is costly, time-consuming and disruptive, so California needs promote the most efficient use of existing lanes. And barring most traffic from lanes that are nearly empty for part of the day is not a sensible approach to meeting that goal.

Read this editorial and more at: http://www.pe.com/opinion/editorials-headlines/20130220-editorial-during-nonpeak-hours-open-car-pool-lanes-to-all.ece#sthash.4JH92mvT.dpuf

Press-Enterprise Editorial: Favors Mike Gatto's Ballot-Box Reform

The Press-Enterprise becomes another in a growing chorus of major publications to editorialize in favor of my ballot-box budgeting fixes.

THE PRESS-ENTERPRISE
Published: 02 July 2012 05:20 PM

"Haphazard budgeting at the ballot box only ensures that the state’s fiscal turmoil will continue. California needs to use available resources wisely. Voters should help advance that effort by rejecting ballot measures that create arbitrary spending formulas and new earmarks.

Ballot-box budgeting is the issue behind AB 2220, by Assemblyman Mike Gatto, D-Los Angeles. The bill would mandate a ballot pamphlet reminder to voters about proposed initiatives that would raise new revenue and dedicate it to specific programs. The official analysis of such measures would have to include language specifying that the money raised by the initiative would go only to the intended programs, and would not be available for other state needs unless voters approved changes later. The requirement would not apply to tax measures that directed the resulting money into the general fund without restriction.

The fate of AB 2220, now in the Senate, is unclear. Gov. Jerry Brown vetoed nearly identical legislation last year, saying that a rote disclaimer in initiative analyses “won’t provide voters greater clarity.” Well-informed voters, of course, already know that legislators have little power to alter initiatives — which is one reason ballot measures are popular with an electorate that distrusts the Legislature.

Regardless of how the bill fares, however, Gatto has a legitimate point: Voters too often decide budget-related ballot measures with little insight into the state’s larger financial picture — or the consequences that result from such disjointed fiscal choices.

California has many voter-approved propositions that limit budgeting flexibility. The most sweeping is Prop. 98, the 1988 measure that requires about 40 percent of the budget to go to education. Prop. 99, also from 1988, raised the cigarette tax and earmarked the money for health programs. Prop. 172 in 1993 raised the sales tax to fund law enforcement. Prop. 10 in 1998 raised the cigarette tax again, directing the money toward early childhood development programs. Prop. 64, in 2004, taxed wealthy Californians to pay for mental health services.

Such tinkering blocks any attempt to set sensible priorities for public spending, and helps make state budgeting more opaque and convoluted. The Legislature should be directing available funds to sustain the most crucial programs first. Instead, the state wrestles with ways to pay for priority services while tax money flows unchecked to less critical programs. Thus Prop. 49, from 2002, requires the state to spend nearly $550 million a year on after-school programs when districts struggle to fund classroom instruction.

Yes, the Legislature has an abysmal record of making shortsighted, reckless financial decisions. But voters will not encourage greater fiscal responsibility by approving arbitrary spending dictates based on whatever cause happens to gain sufficient popular support.

Randomly disrupting sensible allocation of public money is not a strategy for fixing the state’s chronic fiscal woes. Good intentions do not justify ballot measures that make the state’s budget more intractable."

Read more HERE

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Mike Gatto is the Assistant Speaker Pro Tempore of the California State Assembly.  He represents the cities of Burbank, Glendale, and parts of Los Angeles, including Los Feliz, North Hollywood, Silver Lake, Toluca Lake, Valley Glen, and Van Nuys.  He has served in the Assembly since June 2010.  E-mail Mike at: assemblymember.gatto@assembly.ca.gov, or call (818) 558-3043.

Website of Assemblyman Mike Gatto: www.asm.ca.gov/gatto