There are two candidates on the Nov. 8 poll for a four-year time period as California’s state controller. Republican fiscal adviser/educator Lanhee Chen and Democratic state Board of Equalization member Malia Cohen are working for the seat being vacated by Betty Yee, who’s prevented from in search of re-election due to time period limits. Here are solutions to a survey that The San Diego Union-Tribune Editorial Board emailed each candidates.
Q: Why would you like this job?
A: I used to be lucky to develop up in Southern California because the son of immigrants from Taiwan, who got here to this state within the Nineteen Eighties to search out alternatives. But at the moment, it’s clear that Sacramento and the political insiders there have failed us. Too many issues go unsolved, whereas our state spends lots of of billions of {dollars} a yr with mediocre outcomes.
The controller is California’s impartial fiscal watchdog. The one that makes positive that taxpayer cash is spent as we’re informed it is going to be. But that’s not occurring now. In reality, the controller can’t even inform us the place she despatched over $300 billion in funds in 2018 alone.
For too lengthy, the controller has been a Sacramento politician, valuing partisanship over competence. The controller has been beholden to different politicians, defending them as a substitute of combating for taxpayers.
That gained’t be me. I’m not a part of the one-party monopoly that has managed Sacramento for years. It’s time for a verify on the Sacramento insiders who spend first and ask questions later.
We want new management that isn’t afraid to tackle over $20 billion of fraud in our state unemployment insurance coverage system and supply accountability for the billions a yr that California drivers pay in gasoline taxes.
The promise of California remains to be on the market. But we’re going to have to begin fixing our issues quickly for us to be sure that the California my children see is as vivid and promising because the one which introduced my dad and mom right here many years in the past.
Q: What in your background makes you an excellent match for this job?
A: I’m the one candidate for controller who combines expertise in policy-making, training and enterprise with a powerful perception within the values of fiscal duty, transparency and independence.
After attending my native public highschool, I went on to earn 4 levels from Harvard University, together with a legislation diploma and a doctorate in political science. I then had the consideration of serving in senior roles in each Republican and Democratic presidential administrations.
For the final 9 years, I’ve taught at Stanford University and carried out analysis on the Hoover Institution, a public coverage assume tank on campus. In my profession, I’ve helped leaders in California and across the nation develop insurance policies to handle a few of our most urgent fiscal challenges, like making well being care extra inexpensive, saving Social Security and rising our economic system. My writings have appeared in America’s greatest newspapers, and I’ve steadily shared my concepts on tv information packages throughout America.
I constructed my very own small enterprise, which supplies recommendation on fiscal and different coverage points to leaders in the private and non-private sectors. I’m an investor who works with entrepreneurs and innovators to assist them develop their companies and create jobs. And I’ve been chair of the board of administrators of a group well being system within the Bay Area.
Together, I imagine these experiences have ready me properly to be our state’s subsequent controller.
Q: How will your method to the job be much like or totally different than outgoing Controller Betty Yee’s?
A: I admire Betty Yee’s dedication to public service, however I imagine we’d take totally different approaches to the job. For too lengthy, we’ve elected controllers who’ve been extra fascinated about becoming into the insiders membership in Sacramento than standing up for taxpayers first.
I’d be way more aggressive in utilizing the controller’s audit authority to find out not solely the whereabouts of state funds, but additionally to take a look at the efficacy of a few of our state’s greatest spending priorities. I’d additionally look to deliver full and complete transparency to the roughly $300 billion in checks the controller’s workplace writes annually; one thing that controller Yee has argued we do not need the technological capability to do. Finally, I’d use my seat on the 2 massive public pension program boards — CalPERS and CalSTRS — to advertise full transparency into our state’s long-term pension obligations and be sure that each funds are targeted first on delivering promised advantages to present and future retirees, in addition to serving nearly as good stewards of taxpayer sources.
Q: The state’s two large pension funds — the California Public Employees’ Retirement System (CalPERS) and the California State Teachers’ Retirement System (CalSTRS) — report they’re about 72 % to 73 % funded. What, if something, needs to be modified concerning the assumptions of those two funds? What do you say to the pensioners of both fund who is perhaps frightened about their funds?
A: As taxpayers, we’re unable to completely perceive the extent of the unfunded liabilities in our state pension packages. These are liabilities that we are going to be accountable for paying sooner or later. Promises made needs to be guarantees saved, however this can develop into more and more difficult for taxpayers because the unfunded liabilities in these packages mount.
In instances of price range surplus, as now we have skilled not too long ago, the state ought to think about using surplus funds to additional cut back these money owed.
More broadly, our state doesn’t produce a real and full stability sheet that actually accounts for pension program liabilities. Instead, at the moment, Sacramento makes use of gimmicks to cover from taxpayers the true nature of our state’s fiscal situation. One instance is the best way that our state pension funds report on their very own well being. As controller, I’ll combat to make sure that CalPERS and CalSTRS clearly inform taxpayers how a lot they’ll owe as soon as retirement advantages for present and former authorities workers come due.
As talked about in your query, CalPERS estimates that it’s roughly 70 % funded, however bases this on an assumption that it is going to be in a position to obtain a roughly 7 % yearly charge of return. But that’s a benchmark it has met solely half of the time during the last 10 years and one which CalPERS has underperformed during the last 20.
A practical accounting of anticipated returns would improve CalPERS’ unfunded liabilities by a big quantity. California’s taxpayers deserve to listen to the reality on this and different points, and as controller, I’ll be certain that they do.
Q: The State Controller’s Office has broad audit authority over state and native authorities spending. What particular areas would you deal with and the way aggressively would you utilize this energy?
A: I cannot hesitate to make use of my audit authority as controller vigorously and steadily, significantly in analyzing our greatest state spending priorities and components of the price range that could be ripe for fraud or abuse.
Medi-Cal, the joint state-federal well being care program targeted on offering care to lower-income Californians, is only one instance. The controller’s job, partially, is to be sure that the advantages promised to beneficiaries of this system are literally being delivered. This is crucial provided that the variety of residents enrolled in this system has elevated considerably since 2014, however the Controller’s Office has did not comprehensively evaluation its operations for a few years. In reality, the final report that the controller issued on how California’s Department of Health Care Services administers this system was in January 2018, and even that audit didn’t uncover the $4 billion in improper spending {that a} separate report — written by then-State Auditor Elaine Howle — disclosed later that yr.
Sacramento politicians shouldn’t be throwing good cash after dangerous by funding packages which might be both inefficient or ineffective. There are many different spending priorities that I’d study as controller, from the High-Speed Rail Authority to California’s fraud-ridden unemployment insurance coverage and incapacity advantages packages.
Q: How can voters be sure that you’ll be impartial and clear?
A: I’ve a observe file of independence and in depth and particular plans to make sure transparency in our state’s fiscal affairs.
In its endorsement, the Los Angeles Times editorial board mentioned, “we believe Chen is the best choice for this position … because the controller should be as independent from the party in power as possible.”
My opponent, however, represents extra of the identical. In an interview with CalIssues, she mentioned that she would have a “collaborative” method to auditing state authorities, and she or he would probably share detrimental findings with her political allies earlier than sharing them with taxpayers.
As lengthy as controllers are from the identical get together because the politicians writing the checks, they’re going to be rubber stamps, offering little to no accountability. Typically, controllers from the Democratic Party have been politicians with aspirations for larger workplace. This disincentivizes them from holding the Democratic insiders who dominate Sacramento accountable, as a result of they’re extra fascinated about advancing their careers than standing up for taxpayers.
I’ve served presidents of each political events and proven that I can put service and nation earlier than politics. I’ll proceed to do this as California’s subsequent controller.
Q: What is your place on Proposition 1, which might set up the rights for Californians to an abortion and to contraceptives within the state Constitution?
A: I assist girls’s reproductive freedom, which incorporates entry to household planning companies, contraceptives, and abortions as presently allowed underneath California legislation. As controller, I’ll by no means prohibit nor intrude with a girl’s capability to get an abortion or entry to abortion companies. In reality, the controller can neither lawfully impose such restrictions nor interact in such interference.
Furthermore, I assist enshrining present California legislation relating to entry to contraceptives and abortions into our state’s Constitution. I do, nonetheless, have particular considerations about the best way Proposition 1 has been written. On the one hand, I’ve heard from abortion rights advocates expressing concern that the modification has been written in a manner that would spawn litigation endangering reproductive freedoms sooner or later. On the opposite aspect are individuals who oppose abortion, who argue that the modification as drafted would facilitate procedures past what’s presently allowed in state legislation, reminiscent of late-term abortions, which I oppose.
Q: Why ought to voters elect you over your opponent?
A: I’m the one candidate on this race with the precise background and expertise for the job, and the independence wanted to be a real fiscal watchdog for Californians. I’ll put taxpayers first, not like my opponent, who has decades-long political relationships with the very Sacramento insiders that the controller is supposed to carry accountable.
I’ve been endorsed by over a dozen newspapers’ editorial boards throughout California, together with The San Diego Union-Tribune Editorial Board, which mentioned, “Republican fiscal adviser/educator Lanhee Chen is the best fit to replace termed-out Betty Yee as the person who cuts checks for state government and conducts independent audits of how state agencies spend money.”
Sacramento is losing billions of {dollars} yearly. Consider, for instance, the $20 billion in fraudulent unemployment advantages the state handed out at first of the COVID-19 pandemic. That quantity might have paid each Californian’s state gasoline taxes for over two years, or for the salaries of 236,000 public faculty academics!
My spouse and I are elevating our two children within the Bay Area, and we wish to go away them with a California that’s higher than the one we each grew up in. But for that to occur, it’s going to take new management that isn’t afraid to ask robust questions and demand outcomes.
I really like our state, however Sacramento can’t preserve losing a lot of our hard-earned cash. We must spend smarter. I’ll be certain that we do.