Close to Death 2 weeks ago AB 1910 springs back to life
After pulling AB 1910 from the April 6 docket of the Assembly Local Government Committee, bill author Cristina Garcia (D-Bell Gardens) has now set it for a hearing on April 27, which is 2 days before the deadline for bills to pass out of committee. Fiscal bills that don't pass out of their respective policy committees of reference by the 29th die.
Ms. Garcia pulled the bill on the 6th because it did not then have the votes necessary to pass out of committee due to what we believe to be opposition from two key Democratic members of the committee. It was not placed on the regular meeting of the Local Government Committee set for tomorrow (20th), an indicator that Ms. Garcia has likely been trying to amend AB 1910 to curry the favor of at least one of the recalcitrant Democrats, who we believe to be Richard Bloom (D-Santa Monica).
Indeed, that's exactly what Assembly Member Garcia indicated in a Friday CalMatters podcast that we would strongly encourage you to listen to for a number of reasons - not just to confirm what may be going on in terms of finding the amendments necessary to get AB 1910 out of committee, but to listen carefully to what Garcia and her media hosts, one of whom is the housing writer for the Los Angeles Times, think about the utility of golf courses in densely packed neighborhoods - that and just as importantly, the picture of the housing problem in some of those neighborhoods that Ms. Garcia paints so vividly. It's the "Gimme Shelter" podcast and can be found at www.calmatters.org.
We strongly suspect that an op-ed that the Southern California News Group carried Sunday April 10 on the front page of the Opinion Section of the Los Angeles Daily News, Long Beach Telegram, Riverside Press Enterprise, Torrance Daily Breeze, and Orange County Register breathed a little life into Ms. Garcia's cause. It was penned by Marc Joffe of the Reason Foundation; a libertarian think tank that has long taken issue with all sorts of public sector activities that most Americans find integral parts of life. An interesting confluence of political left and right to be sure and one that ought to get the attention of a besieged golf community. We would share a link to it, but it is so full of cherry-picked facts and intellectually dishonest argumentation that we don't want to give it any more play than it has received already.
Garcia has not filed any amendments yet, and there is no guarantee that we'll see them in a timely fashion. We have to believe there are amendments on their way, assuming they can be worked out to the satisfaction of prior opposers and supporters. If not, the bill very well could be pulled again.
We suggested this possibility when we reported April 6's reversal of fortune. We pledged to remain vigilant through the end of April, and we have. Golfers can remain vigilant by continuing to express their opinions to their legislators. Nothing matters more.