Lawmakers Return, Face Tough New Issues

The Legislature officially convened its 1987-88 session Monday confronted with a series of tough new problems and a major unresolved issue that has defied resolution--Gov. George Deukmejian’s proposed state prison near downtown Los Angeles.

On the must-do agenda, the controversial prison is “the most immediate, most important, No. 1,” declared Senate minority leader James W. Nielsen (R-Rohnert Park).

While the Los Angeles prison occupied much of the attention of many lawmakers, a variety of newly surfaced issues also greeted them. They range from implementation of the so-called “English-only” ballot initiative, to simplifying California taxes, to devising a way to make liability insurance more available and affordable, to the need this year to hold state spending to a limit approved by the voters in 1979.

Assembly Speaker Willie Brown (D-San Francisco) included implementation of Proposition 65, the anti-toxics initiative overwhelmingly approved by the voters Nov. 4, on his list of top priorities. “Proposition 65 did not solve the toxics problem,” he told the Assembly.

Brown also listed as priorities research into AIDS, aiding the homeless, extending bilingual education in the schools “in a substantive fashion” and overhauling the workers compensation insurance system.

However, no major work on bills was conducted Monday. The formal start of the new session was essentially ceremonial, giving lawmakers a chance to elect new officers, swear in new and old members and get a head start on introduction of legislation. The lawmakers plan to be in the Capitol only a few days for the annual rite of reorganization, and legislative work will not begin in earnest until they return in January.

Deukmejian spokesman Kevin Brett noted that the governor has been adamant that the Los Angeles prison be built quickly and added, “You certainly are going to hear more from him until this matter is resolved.”

No one forecast a quick solution to the long stalemate over building the prison near the heavily Latino Eastside. But Senate leader David A. Roberti (D-Los Angeles), an outspoken opponent of the proposed prison site, said almost wistfully that “we want to get this thing behind us.” Roberti cautiously told reporters there is “a good chance” that a compromise can be fashioned next month when the Legislature returns.

The Los Angeles prison has drawn fire from legislators representing Eastside Los Angeles residents as being too close to schools and a hazardous waste site. Opponents, including Roberti and Sen. Art Torres (D-Los Angeles), have demanded a complete environmental study as well as a second prison site somewhere in rural Los Angeles County.

In an effort to get the prison issue off dead center, Sen. Robert Presley (D-Riverside), Deukmejian’s legislative point man on prison construction matters, introduced legislation that he said could be used to embody a settlement of the prison issue. A hearing of the Senate Judiciary Committee was set for Dec. 18-19.

On the “English-only” issue, legislation was introduced that would spend about $5.5 million to teach English to adults who speak a foreign language and Californians who are functionally illiterate. Torres said his bill is aimed at carrying out a provision of Proposition 63, which declares English to be the state’s official language and requires the Legislature to “preserve and enhance” English.

He noted that there now are tens of thousands of non-English-speaking adults throughout the state waiting to enroll in classes that teach English as a second language. Under his bill, the vastly expanded classes would be taught in community colleges, high school night courses and by community organizations. He said the program would be financed by “redirecting” money now “wasted” in the education bureaucracy.

In the Assembly, Brown said another major issue facing the Legislature is preparation of next year’s state budget. Passage of the last two budgets went relatively smoothly, with political compromises simplified by the healthy growth of tax revenues. But spending has grown so fast that the state now threatens to exceed the constitutional spending limit mandated by a 1979 ballot measure sponsored by anti-tax crusader Paul Gann.

“We are going to have to worry seriously about the Gann limit in 1987 as we look at the budget,” Brown told lawmakers.

Brown said he has been told by the Legislature’s nonpartisan budget analyst that the state may in fact already be over the limit. Brown told reporters during an impromptu news conference that he considered the spending limit to be the Legislature’s “most immediate, pressing issue.”

On another matter, lawmakers lost no time in introducing legislation designed to simplify California’s tax codes and bring the state into conformity with the sweeping federal tax reforms passed this year by Congress.

One version of the tax conformity bill was introduced by Assemblymen Elihu M. Harris (D-Oakland) and Dennis Brown (R-Long Beach). Their bill is aimed at producing a tax code so simple that most taxpayers could file their returns on a postcard-like form. Another bill, put together by the staffs of the Senate and Assembly tax committees, will be unveiled later this week.

Brown introduced a bill that would allow Citicorp Bank of New York to enter the bidding for the Bank of America. First Interstate Bank of Los Angeles already has a bid on the table for the San Francisco-based Bank of America. Brown said he hopes his bill will foster competitive bidding.

The Speaker said he hopes the Bank of America will remain whole if it ultimately is sold.