Interview of Lucille Kring ,candidate for 34th Senate District

Background. On July 10th I posted a story addressing Senator Lou Correa’s leadership role in passage of the 3%@50 public pension obligation that is bankrupting our state.
In responding to the two dozen comments on that post I mentioned plans to contact his Republican challenger Lucille Kring for an Orange Juice interview of her campaign to unseat Lou this year. Here is the link to that post: http://www.orangejuiceblog.com/2010/07/did-you-know-that-lou-correa-was-principal-co-author-of-3-50-pension/

Lucille agreed to meet for that interview in her campaign HQ today.

Note: Art Pedroza addressed this local Senate race in his Oct 5th New Santa Ana blog where he quotes excerpts from Lucille’s web site. Due to technical issues the Juice radio participation by Lucille was canceled last Wednesday. I have advised him of this interview.

The 34th Senate District of CA, with 846,792 residents, includes all of Stanton and parts of Anaheim, Buena Park, Fullerton, Garden Grove, Santa Ana and Westminster.

The current Senate representative of this District is (D) Lou Correa who was elected to this post in 2006. Mr. Correa was previously elected to the Board of Supervisors in 2004 after serving in the State Assembly.

An analysis of the District indicates that 58.5 percent of the residents are registered to vote with Democrats holding the edge at 46.1% to Republicans at 35.9%. This follows the trend where other party registration will determine the winner of this race.

The three top cities in the 34th, in terms of registered voters, are Anaheim followed closely by Santa Ana and Garden Grove.

(R) Lucille Kring currently serves on the Anaheim City Council where she previously served from 1998 to 2002. She stayed out of the council race in 2002 but returned in 2006 and won a seat by finished second with 21,783 votes.

Q & A follows:

LG. Lucille. When we spoke last year you mentioned a desire to run for mayor of Anaheim as Curt Pringle is termed out this year. As you are currently running for the 34th Senate District seat what changed your mind to seek this other office?

LK  Great question Larry. There were many reasons why I decided to change from mayors race to state senate. I was shown the figures that Lou Correa can be beaten. He is very vulnerable on many issues and the state is in a financial crisis. They just passed a budget that I believe just pushed everything into the future. It’s smoke and mirrors.  It really doesn’t do anything to get that $19 billion deficit down.

We have 144 companies that have left CA in the last 2 years because of over regulation. We have 2.3 million private sector jobs that have left the state but we have 38,000 public sector jobs that have been created in the last 2 years. And I just think enough is enough. We’ve got to stop this. Companies are leaving the state. People are losing their jobs. We’re creating more public sector jobs. Whose going to pay for that?

Our kids graduate from college with Bachelors or Master’s degree can’t find a job–There are so many problems with the state. The education system, the crumbling infrastructure. Education system, crumbling infrastructure, jobs leaving. We need to get tort reform under control. It’s a myriad of things as to why I am running for State Senate.

LG. As our state legislature has finally approved our $87.5 billion 2010-11 budget let’s start with a few questions on that topic. Do you believe the revenue assumptions?

LK. “Absolutely not.

LG. Do you believe the state will get a $5.4 billion bailout from the federal government?

LK.  I don’t see how the fed Govt can do it. They are in more in debt than we are.

LG Do you accept the assumption of an upturn in the economy next year resulting in our receiving an additional $1.4 billion in tax revenue?

LK.  I don’t see it. I have a small business. My husband and I opened it a little over 2 years ago. Our business has declined substantially so when they say the recession was over last June I don’t know what June they’re talking about. If you don’t have a job and you’re living on your pension or living on unemployment you have no money for disposable income. You can’t go to restaurants, movies or shopping. There is no disposable income.

LG. Do you feel it is being truthful with voters pushing back into the next fiscal year almost $2 billion owed to K-14 education?

LK.  Absolutely not. Our schools are in bad shape now they need the money today.

LG. What do you feel are the three top issues that you will need to address?

LK. Jobs, jobs, jobs, but that’s only one. We need to cut the regulations. There are people who would love to be in this state and bring jobs here but they cannot afford it. They cannot afford the regulations. When we opened our business 2 1/2 years ago, between the city, the county and the state, it cost us 35% more than to do the buildout. We never realized there were so many regulations before we started or we probably would not have done it. The state, with all the state’s requirements for air, water the environment we are destroying this country.  We’re all for clean air and clean water but you cannot keep squashing business’s. Pretty soon they’ll be no business.

Number one. Reduce the regulations so we can to get the companies back to get the jobs back.

 Second. Get the union pensions under control. They are destroying this state and they have got to be a part of the solution. They cannot just be part of the problem. There are some really good people who are union members, and they have no choice right to work state.  You must be union members to work in CA.

3rd is our crumbling infrastructure. Our infrastructure has not been attended to in decades. We just put a Band-Aid here and a Band-Aid there. Our gasoline mileage should go for roads and improvements not into the general fund so that those are my 3 top issues that I would focus on.

LG. While a good start, will revising the pension system for new hires solve our short term pension dilemma?

LK.  No. It’s a nice start but it’s not going to have any impact. It’s a wing and a prayer. How many new people do we have to hire? I understand people are retiring but we are trying to get the public sector employees ratchet’d down.

LG. With almost a 20% drop out rate from California high schools, and less than 70% of the students graduating, what do you envision as a plan to address this education failure?

LK.  It is really a crisis. Right now, currently 45 cents of every dollar actually goes into the classroom. I think that we should bring 75 cents of every dollar back into the classroom so that we can bring back art and music back into the classrooms. But I also think these kids are bored. Not every kid should go to college. Not every kid wants to go to college. I would like to see vocational training come back. There is no problem working with your hands. You can make a good living. We all need plumbers, electricians, carpenters and landscape people at some time in our lives.

Lucille my next question deals with public safety which is the top responsibility at any level of government. We have a dichotomy. We wish to keep criminals off the streets while struggling to balance a budget. The cost to incarcerate each inmate is roughly $30,000 annually.

LG.  What is your position on last years early release mandate?

LK.  “I think the early release mandate was a mistake. It could be two months, it could be 3 weeks. Just a short period of time. I have a real problem with the system. If you were incarcerated you have to go anger management training, you had to go to drug and alcohol counseling.
You have to show that you were ready to go back into society.
Now its a determinant sentence. You do your 3-5 years get out for good behavior and you don’t learn anything.
We have to face reality. These prisoners are coming back into society unless you’re on death row. We better start preparing prisoners with some kind of job education. Get their GED. The recidivism rate is much, much, much too high.

LG. A hot issue in Orange County is the fate of the Fair Grounds. When elected what is your recommendation for resolving that pending property sale? Note: $96 mil Facility Mgmt West. Phil Enterprises currently runs the property and may take legal action.

LK.  I don’t think in this environment with these market conditions you will ever get the true value of the fairgrounds and so I think it would be foolhardy to put this property up for sale at a bargain rate payment.
I think the city of CM has worked long and hard. They’ve got some great plans. I would like it to remain in CM and I know the people who run the fair. I don’t think we should sell it for less than $98 million that they say its valued.

LG. OCTA has just funded the ARTIC Regional Transportation Center.  What’s your position on spending $85 billion for a Public/Private 800 mile high speed rail network in CA?

LK.  I absolutely am 100% against high speed rail. I think its a boondoggle. I think the voters 2 years ago were misled. It will create jobs if it’s ever out of the planning stage which I don’t think it ever will be. I don’t think they have the ridership, Amtrak doesn’t have the ridership so for every ticket that’s bought the taxpayers will be on the hook to subsidize that. High speed rail operations will be paid for by the taxpayers in CA not from the feds. It was just in the paper where (Jim) Dottie from Chapman said in the next 10 years high speed rail will still be in the planning phase.

LG. Do you support or oppose the taking of private property for another private entity as happened in the Kelo decision?

LK.  Absolutely not.

 Let me point out that on July 10th I wrote a story pointing out that Lou Correa was a principal co-author of SB 400, the 3%@50 pension benefit.

Your opponent, Senator Correa, has attacked your voting record on the Anaheim city council.

LG. Were you on the council when the public pensions for city employees was approved? What is the current pension plan for city employees? If so did you vote in favor or in opposition to that benefit? Did you vote to increase those pensions?

LK.  City employee pension was never changed. It was our police and fire. Ever since Mr. Correa was in the Assembly, and co-authored (SB 400), every city around us adopted 3%@50 for public safety personnel. We could not get police or fire personnel because they would not come to us. We were really forced to go ahead with that.
We did, and I voted for the 3@50 for police and fire, not for general employees.

LG. In your campaign for city council did you pledge to oppose increases in taxes and fees?

LK.  I said taxes. fees are a different matter because we own the utilities.

LG. On a web site Mr. Correa lists your Jan 12th Resolution votes relating to water and electricity rates. How do you respond to those charges?

LK.  Lucille responded to a table issued by Lou Correa on the number of Anaheim’s retired employees. Lucille reacted by saying that I know Mr. Correa is hitting me on that. Over 80% of the people getting ($100,000) pensions were gone before I got on the council in 1998. She repeated saying that “90% of the people listed by Lou on that web site were not there when I got elected to council.”
As to Resolutions in Jan 2010. I absolutely did vote for the fees for water and trash. Trash and electricity. That is directly as a result of the cost of doing business. Our long term contracts with peak generating plants and when the generating plants cost more money to operate the city, Anaheim’s’ electricity department doesn’t have enough money to fund it. It’s a pass through to the voters.

As to water. We have been in a drought for a number of years. We have to buy a lot of imported water from the Metropolitan (Water District). As those water rates go up its a pass through to the customer. We could not offer these services unless there is a pass through.

SAC mandates diverting 50% of the trash out of the landfills. Fifty percent diversion must be green energy. It cost a lot more than dumping the trash in a landfill. Every time that happens we get charged more by our trash hauler and we have to pass it on. The city of Anaheim is very business friendly. No matter what department, it’s a pass through. We don’t manufacture anything. If our costs go up it’s a pass through.

LG. Prop 23 relating to greenhouse gas and global warming as approved by AB32, calls for a temporary suspension of that global warming Bill.
What is your position on Prop 23?

LK.  I want it to be a permanent stay. I think anything to do with cap and trade and global warming is a hoax. It’s a joke. And when you have these supposed green jobs being created, for every green job you create, you’re losing jobs. And they don’t pay very much either.

LG. As an elected city council member, what is your opinion on Prop 22 that is designed to protect local funds from being raided by the state government?

LK.  I’m all for that. I signed the petition.

LG. As the just approved budget was 100 days late what is your position on Prop 25 as it relates to changing the 2/3rds rule for passage of future budgets?

LK. I would not like to see the 2/3rds vote changed because a majority could just ram through carte blanche. to raise taxes.