The June 22 race for Senate District 15 is no ordinary contest. Coming two weeks after the high-profile June 8 primary, it risks falling victim to voter apathy—yet it’s arguably one of the most critical races in the state. Together with the race for Senate District 12, which includes Salinas and Modesto, the outcome could shatter Sacramento’s crippling gridlock by wresting control away from the Republican party, which has sorely abused its minority rights and put ideology above California’s welfare.
There are two chief reasons Santa Cruz Democrat John Laird is the best candidate for the District 15 seat: the budget and the environment. When Laird went to Sacramento in 2002 as an Assemblymember representing District 27, he quickly established himself as a rising star. One of a handful of freshmen appointed to lead a committee (Environmental Safety and Toxic Materials), he went on to chair the Assembly Budget Committee starting in 2004 and become one of the capital’s budget experts. While a champion of social services—he authored, and got passed in both chambers, a bill to provide health care for all the state’s children—he’s also an advocate of fiscal discipline who wants all revenue-spending voter initiatives to identify a funding source. He was the first to propose charging a vehicle registration fee in order to fund state parks, an idea that will be on November’s ballot. He’s a bipartisan player who recognizes the need for deep structural reform but knows how to succeed in the current environment.
His opponent, the powerful San Luis Obispo Republican Sam Blakeslee, has wisely portrayed himself as a forward-thinking moderate with an interest in alternative energy. But Blakeslee tipped his hand when he signed onto Grover Norquist’s Taxpayer Protection Pledge. By making a promise to a Washington rainmaker never to raise taxes, Blakeslee agreed to put party dogma above the interest of the state he serves. He is at least a man of his word; as Assembly Minority Leader last year and one of the “Big 5” with a seat at the final budget negotiating table, Blakeslee refused to countenance any revenue increases whatsoever. Whatever one thinks of California’s spending habits, a crisis of this severity deserves more than simplistic adherence to ideology.
On the environment, Laird’s record is sterling. Starting in 1985, when as a Santa Cruz councilmember he supported an innovative measure aimed at preventing oil drilling off the coast—a measure adopted by 26 cities and counties by 1990—he’s consistently defended the environment, working in the Assembly to procure oil spill cleanup funding, establishing the Sierra Nevada Conservancy and authoring legislation to prevent a repeat of the LBAM debacle. He was one of the original authors of AB 32, California’s progressive carbon emissions law.
Blakeslee, a former geologist with Exxon, voted last year to approve offshore oil drilling on the Tranquillon Ridge, a vote he surely regrets now. In recent years he’s authored and supported legislation on alternative energy, but the two candidates’ lifetime League of Conservation Voters scores give a better sense of the big picture: Blakeslee’s score is 25, Laird’s is 100.
The Santa Cruz Weekly recommends voting for John Laird for Senate District 15 on June 22.
