A California Republican

Special sessions are becoming more and more common. This is the 12th, 13th and 14th special sessions under our current Governor.

Special session have to be called for a specific purpose, and bills passed in those special sessions must be related to that purpose. The three special sessions are for: water, redoing the tax code, and education reforms. Special sessions are now the norm in California. Instead of being “special” - or infrequent - these sessions have become common. They are called to handle issues that the Legislature does not want , or won’t, take up during the regular session. Legislators complain that they don’t have enough time during the regular session to handle the big issues and the budget problems. That is patently untrue, since the legislators have time to fund raise, go on trips, create bills about issues that don’t matter to most Californians, and do all kinds of little things - but they don’t tackle the big issues.

There is something else about special sessions - they cost money. The legislators are paid a per diem when they are in Sacramento on official business - and this includes special sessions. It might not be a large amount of money (it depends on how long the special sessions go on) but it is still money the state spends that it does not have. This is a ridiculous use of money.

Anyone can tell you what the result of the special session will be - nothing. The issues of water, education reform and tax reform are too politically sensitive to get any legislator to deal with. Not to mention that water costs a lot of money, education has a powerful union lobby that wants to prevent change, and tax reform is too complex for the legislators to understand.

So instead of receiving a solution to problems, the tax payers will simply get another bill to pay.

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