By Robin S. Sullivan

I am committed to making our public education system the best in the nation. I do not support programs such as "vouchers" which are essentially a surrender of our public schools.

I believe we can make our schools the best again with the following policies:

I believe that local communities should have major authority and control over their schools and education. Because California communities are inherently so diverse in their demographics, culture, customs, needs and wants, a "one-size-fits-all" approach of legislating from Sacramento on education and schools simply will not work. We should work towards administering our local schools with far less State regulatory intervention and far less State mandated paperwork. Teachers must be allowed to teach, not spend their valuable time filling out government forms and trying to figure out the plethora of ever-changing State policies. Unrestricted, discretionary funds should be given to local schools to be spent pursuant to actual community needs. Parents, school boards, administrators and community members know what is best for their children, not people in Sacramento who are unfamiliar with their community.

Along with more freedom in administering education and schools locally, comes accountability. I do believe that students, parents and teachers should all be held jointly accountable for any failure of pupil learning. Without strong accountability, the public debate, blaming lack of competition as the cause of public education failure, will persist.

We must do more to encourage people to become teachers to address the coming shortage of qualified educators. Californias growing population means we will need thousands and thousands of new teachers in the years ahead. In addition to giving local school districts the funds they need to raise teachers salaries, the State can increase scholarships to teaching colleges and provide other incentives for young people to choose teaching as a career.

Lastly, all students must have access to technology to meet the needs of the 21st century, yet still be fluent in traditional basics such as reading, math, science and social studies. Education curriculum and teaching methods should never be driven by the latest education fad out of Sacramento.

Funding Community Services: During the past decade, State legislators have selfishly shifted local tax dollars out of our communities. The local property taxes we struggle to pay on our homes and businesses are now spent on State programs and services that have nothing to do with us or our community. Even though there is an estimated $15 billion dollar surplus sitting in bulging State coffers, our current State Assemblymember fails to reverse the law that permits the State to confiscate our local tax dollars. Meanwhile, our own communities struggle to provide basic police and fire services. Meanwhile, our own communities are forced to defer maintenance of community parks, streets and buildings. Meanwhile, we continue to lose the funds and services that make our communities healthy. I support repealing the law that shifted your local tax dollars to the State.

Local Citizen Control (home rule): I support local citizen control over community issues. I believe that our political will and strength as citizens is grounded in the local community where we reside and where we have direct access to the decision-making process of the local officials we elect. But now citizen strength is being systematically crippled by State legislative raids on local community revenues, by unfunded State mandates that sap community resources, and by unrestrained State interference in basic local matters. Soon the character and future of your community will be determined by faceless state bureaucrats and legislators who have never stepped foot in your town. And, although these people have no knowledge of your community's unique heritage, culture, demographics, needs and wants, they will decide what's best for you. When elected I will fight to regain home rule. I will promote legislation that restores strong local control and I will fight legislation that weakens your citizen control.

Choice: I support efforts and education to reduce the number of unwanted pregnancies from occurring, but acknowledge that decisions about reproductive freedom should be made by a woman in consultation with medical and/or spiritual advisors, not by the government or by politicians.

Health Care: I will work towards affordable, accessible and quality health care for all Californians, especially children, lower income seniors, and lower income working families that are not able to afford adequate coverage. I would support providing incentives, such as tax credits, for small businesses to enable them to assist in providing coverage to employees.

I would explore a periodic tax refund to lower income persons who do not have a tax liability to offset the cost of the health premium.

I believe doctors, not bureaucrats or politicians, should make medical decisions. I believe that when lawyers, politicians and bureaucrats interfere with the doctor-patient relationship, the cost of health care goes up and the quality of health care goes down.

Just as getting letting HMO administrators in the middle of health care can decrease the quality of care, so can letting trial lawyers.

I strongly believe in maintaining the existing protections that keep lawsuits from driving up medical costs. Attempts by trial lawyers to change these protections will lead to more litigation and higher expenses. The effects of increased litigation will cause medical malpractice premiums paid by doctors and hospitals to increase, resulting in higher health care costs. Due to these rising costs, access to health care will decrease and the uninsured population will increase. This will affect women and working poor the most, with many losing access to obstetric-gynecologic services or joining the ranks of the uninsured. The supply of health services in rural and inner city areas will decrease, as higher malpractice costs force those practices serving the indigent out of business.

At a time that we are trying to increase access to health care, we should not be enriching trial lawyers and driving up health care costs. Let doctor and patients control health care costs and decisions, not HMOs or trial lawyers!

Gun Safety: I support gun safety technology, such as trigger locks and "smart guns", and encourage more research into those solutions. Keeping guns out of the hands of children is a high priority. Parents must be held responsible for any death or injuries caused by their child gaining access to a gun in their household. Educating our children to stay away from guns is necessary, in case they do gain access to a gun.

In recent years, both the state and federal governments have passed a number of new guns laws. Governor Davis has said that he does not think any new gun laws are needed until we have the time to see how these new laws are working.

We need to strictly enforce the guns laws that are already on the books. Attempting to make it harder for law-abiding citizens to have guns is not the answer, as the true problem is the use of guns in criminal activity. Too many of us have had to protect ourselves, or have friends and relatives who would not be with us today, had they not had a gun to protect themselves during a violent assault. In a perfect world, perhaps guns would have never been invented; but they were, and that is our reality. Reality is also that society will never get guns out of the hands of criminals. Therefore, we should focus our efforts on reducing crime and the use of guns in connection with criminal activities through strong deterrent legislation. We should also provide our law enforcement agencies and district attorneys offices with adequate funding and resources to fully enforce all existing laws.