Candidate for
Member; California State Assembly; District 4

Warren for Assembly 420 P Street Lincoln, CA 95648 FPPC#: 1240757

A Square Deal for Everyday Californians

I believe that a democratic society should serve the everyday people who comprise it. To realize that goal, we must have a government that is effective, representatives who are sensible, leaders who are ethical, and an economy that is fair.

We must equip our state with the tools it needs to effectively deal with the consequences of urban growth. California's state and local governments have utterly failed to solve the problems that most immediately afflict us; transportation, housing, and air quality. These issues are regional in scope, yet there exist no regional agencies with the authority to address them, and that is a glaring omission in the structure of our state's government. We should urge the Legislature to appoint a blue-ribbon commission to recommend changes in the state's constitution that will enable our elected officials to manage the problems associated with growth.

We must restore common sense to our government. Legislators from both parties should listen to the concerns of the people, rather than blindly pursuing a partisan agenda. The enactment of good legislation requires cooperation and compromise among lawmakers of differing points of view. Regrettably, many of today's legislators would rather be ideologically pure than productive.

We should insist that leaders in business and government behave ethically. We should withhold government contracts from law-breaking firms, require that polluters clean up their messes, punish businesses that manipulate their books or the energy market, and demand that elected officials abide by the same ethical standards they expect from everyone else.

We should ensure that our economy fairly rewards those responsible enough to work for a living. We must establish universal health care, make prescription drugs affordable, restore the purchasing power of the minimum wage, set minimum standards for paid vacation, protect employees from unjust firing, defend the right to unionize, and end employers' permanent use of temporary workers.

If we do our part for society by working for a living, paying our taxes, and obeying the law, then society should do its part for us. We are entitled to a government that can solve our state's most serious problems, representatives who will fight for us, leaders who are respectable, and an economy that fairly pays us. That's what I call a "square deal," and that's what I'll be fighting for as your representative.