The Desk Is Clear: Gov. Gavin Newsom Signs Bills His Predecessor Didn’t, Vetoes Pricey Effort To Fund Affordable Housing

Speaker 1: 00:00 The deadline for California governor Gavin Newsome to sign bills from the last legislative session came yesterday and today there's plenty of talk about it among some of the highlights that governor signed a bill clearing the way for the pure water San Diego program to continue the program slated to delivery third of San Diego's water by 2035 via purifying waste water phase two lawsuits, which threatened to kill it. The governor also signed a bill from San Diego assembly mentor Gloria, which will ban gun sales at the Del Mar fair grounds beginning in 2021. Joining me now to talk about other bills is been Adler of Capitol public radio. Ben, welcome. Good to be with you. So can you start by telling us about other gun-related bills the governor signed? Speaker 2: 00:44 I think the most significant of gun bills that the governor signed this year, uh, is one that Jerry Brown vetoed a couple of times previously. And that's an expansion of the state's red flag laws, gun violence restraining order program. So this is where right now a family member or law enforcement agency can, uh, petition a judge for a restraining order against someone they believe could be dangerous. Uh, and then the restraining order would be served by police and guns, magazines or ammunition would be confiscated. The legislation, the new law is going to allow employers, coworkers and teachers to petition for restraining orders as well. Now it's opposed both by gun rights groups and the American civil liberties union. And Brown vetoed it in the past saying that he really does think that, you know, the existing law, law enforcement and family members is the right balance. Best situated he wrote to make these especially consequential decisions, but Newsome who has been very more in favor of, I mean, Jerry Brown signed some gun control measures, vetoed others definitely paddled a bit to the left paddle a bit to the right. Uh, but, but Newsome has definitely made a gun control one of his leading causes and he went ahead and signed this measure. Speaker 1: 01:57 Well, is there anything in the bill that address concerns, uh, about this, these red flag laws being expanded and also about those laws being applied inconsistently? Speaker 2: 02:08 I think that's, you know, part of the legislative debate is anytime you've got this line, and again by going through the legislative process, you're going to have these arguments play out year after year and at some point, you know, the politics change, the votes have always been there in the legislature despite opposition from first amendment and second amendment groups on the left and on the right. And you have a governor who's more willing to sign it. So I think that was just, you know, I think backers knew they didn't need to necessarily make major changes in order to get this through because of who's in the governor's office. Speaker 1: 02:40 All right. A bill which will ban privately run prisons and detention centers will also go into effect on January 1st of next year. What was the reasoning behind this one and is the controversy over the treatment of a little illegal immigrants part of that reasoning? Speaker 2: 02:56 Well, I think it's only part of it. I think Newsome had campaign to say he wants to end California's use of private prisons. It is, you know, an example where, you know, he has his, you know, been out there publicly on it. And I the, the thing is though, the state was already kind of moving in that direction, uh, even before he took office and then continued to move in that direction because the use of private prisons in California started popping up because there were relatively few, if any other options, you had court orders saying California needed to reduce its prison population cap because the prisons were overcrowded. And uh, you know, you still had, even though you had the, the state making moves to, you know, make counties more responsible for low level offenders then than the state and in shift responsibility from the state to counties, you still had, uh, you know, at, you know, complete capacity and, and so you had the use of private prisons being ramped up as a, as a result. Speaker 2: 03:55 Now the population has started to drop because of some of the policy changes that have been made under governor Brown. And, and so it was relatively easy, I think for Newsome to be able to keep this promise. So starting in January, the state department of corrections will no longer be able to start a renewal contract that that places state inmates and for-profit prisons with the exception however, that the state can renew or extend the contract to comply with a court ordered prison population cap. And then altogether there's the ban on incarceration of state inmates at private prisons in 2028 and then immigration or in immigrant detention centers are also going to be wined wound down under this legislation and also victims of sexual abuse will now have more time to file lawsuits. How much more time do they have now? Well, before the current law or before the law that the governor just signed, uh, it was according to the author's office, eight years, within eight years of reaching adulthood or three years of the date that a survivor who reached adulthood discovers or reasonably should have discovered that they suffered damages as a result of the assault, whichever comes later. Speaker 2: 05:03 And so now the new law is going to expand both the statute of limitations for the time given to victims of childhood sexual assault from age 26 to 40. And that period for when you discover or reasonably discover that you suffered damages from three to five years. Again, a measure that Jerry Brown vetoed in the past. And the Bill's author even said on Twitter that Brown was working even out of office trying to get this bill to, to, to not be signed. But, uh, Newsome did sign it. Also, the governor signed several animal welfare bills, a ban on the sale of animal fair, new rules governing the sale of horses for slaughter and a ban on circus animals will now become law. Can you talk about how those came about? He did take action on a series of animal bills and then there was one that he just snuck in late last night. Speaker 2: 05:51 Uh, he signed one that basically allows California to take the first steps toward, uh, eating roadkill. And I'm just going to pause and let you soak that. When in eating roadkill right now you can't and you, you need permits to be able to, you know, from the state fish and wildlife department to be able to, you know, hunt and eat what you, what you kill. Uh, so this build sets up a pilot program to explore, well, you could get a, you could get a permit to eat roadkill. Okay. Well I guess at the end of the day, that is a very personal decision. Speaker 2: 06:25 Yes, that's, that's well put. All and, and also there were hitting the snooze button on start times for schools. Correct. Ooh, I like that one. Well you're on a roll. Yes, this is going to effect and it's not going to take effect right away. It'll start in 2022 or when they're, when the collective bargaining agreement expires. But for middle schools, they will no longer be able to start before eight o'clock. High schools will no longer be able to start before eight 30. And this is another example of a bill that had failed in previous years, died two years ago in the legislature, vetoed last year by Jerry Brown. Newsome signed it. And it has to do with, well, the science suggests that a adolescent and teenage brains work better if you get a little more sleep. Obviously we all work better when we get more sleep, but also just starting a little bit later in the morning in theory, is supposed to improve the environment for learning. All right. I've been speaking with Ben Adler of capital public radio. Ben, thank you so much. You're welcome.