Senator George Runner
Serving the 17th District which incorporates portions of the Los Angeles, San Bernardino, Ventura and Kern counties.

During Senate Floor Session last week, I spoke against Senate Bill 1475 (Simitian). If signed into law, the bill would impose harsher penalties on drivers who text or talk on their cell phones by increasing the fine and making it worth one point on their driver’s license. The author tries to play the bill off as a small and simple fee increase, but that is not the case. Adding a point to a person’s driver’s license is a major cause for concern as it would result in thousands of dollars of increased insurance costs. Although most of the Republican Senators voted against it, the bill passed out of the Senate.

Despite tax hikes, state revenues fell

According to the Tax Foundation, as the economic recession continued through fiscal year 2009, state tax revenues fell significantly, with only five states collecting more in 2009 than they had in 2008. Among the 45 states that collected less in 2009, many saw declines of more than 10 percent—all this despite the many tax hikes that states enacted. In addition to presenting new Census data for 2009 and comparing it to 2008, we take a look back at the last decade, examining tax revenue by type to identify the sources of tax volatility.

California: Overall Change -15.0% State Rank 46