The SCC utilizes the Vulnerability Index–Service Prioritization Decision Assistance Tool (VI-SPDAT)—a survey on one’s risk factors—to decide where to place unhoused locals. The higher severity of issues, the more permanent housing they are awarded, according to the County. In City Journal, Judge Glock unpacks why subsidizing substance abuse and criminal behavior through the VI-SPDAT only exacerbates local homelessness crises.
Read MoreOverheated and unsubstantiated racializing of issues is nothing new in SJ politics. What's new in 2022 is how everyday citizens are finding the verve to challenge unhinged accusations and baseless allegations. Nancy DeMattei chimes in on the Northside Neighborhood email list and demolishes claims that D3 candidate Irene Smith's flyer is racist.
Read MoreWhy aren’t renewable energy advocates discussing the thousands of essential products (incl. hand sanitizer, disinfectants, and medical masks) that require fossil fuels during production? In Fox & Hounds Daily, independent public policy consultant Todd Royal contends that suppressing the COVID-19 pandemic required more than “green” energy, and that banning natural gas production locally has dangerous public health ramifications.
Read MoreAnalyzing UC Berkeley student groups’ new anti-Israel bylaws, civil rights expert Kenneth Marcus unpacks the (il)legality of excluding individuals by ethnic/racial identity. While defended as reasonable selectivity by student orgs, these bylaws blatantly discriminate against “Zionists” due to their country of origin, their culture: factors they did not choose. That doesn’t seem reasonable — or constitutional — at all, asserts Marcus.
Read MoreJon Coupal — president of CA’s nonpartisan Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association — posits in the OC Register that effective tax policies, like longstanding Prop 13, must be fiercely protected. While it may be vogue to call tax reduction laws unjust and inequitable, Coupal cites evidence in favor of practical, beneficial, realistic property tax legislation.
Read MoreWhile advocacy organizations from multiple angles continue analyzing the State’s contentious (and confusing) SCA 10/Prop 1, Californian press remains, for the most part, oddly quiet. In the latest Opp Now exclusive, local attorneys and organizations interpret whether this bill would alter existing restrictions on late-term abortion operations. An Opp Now exclusive.
Read MoreAfter notable nationwide school choice victories in 2021, the California Teachers Association (CTA) still fiercely opposes two local school voucher initiatives. In the California Policy Center, educational commentator Larry Sand refutes CTA talking points against school choice, emphasizing that vouchers improve educational outcomes without hurting local public schools.
Read MoreIrene Smith and Omar Torres, candidates for downtown D3, go back in time and critique what they see as profligate downtown redevelopment spending and misguided pension reform. An Opp Now exclusive.
Read MoreEditor and urban studies fellow Joel Kotkin and assistant professor Marshall Toplansky explain how California’s exorbitant cost of living has seen tech workers electing to work remotely out-of-state. With Silicon Valley as a pivotal foundation of the State’s economy, this change — combined with rampant tech company exoduses — could spell trouble for California cities' economic and planning models.
Read MoreGinny Gentles (co-founder of the Educational Freedom Center at the Independent Women’s Forum) responds to Dan Lips’ National Review article, which explains that parents are justifiably demanding public school reform, particularly expanded parental choice, amidst local schools’ academic failures. Gentles unpacks the challenges of modeling CA’s education system after states like Arizona (which leads the nation in educational savings account programs), as suggested by Lips. Adopting a local program may not be as simple as plug-and-play, but CA’s abundance of charter schools offers us a leg-up, says Gentles. An Opp Now exclusive.
Read MoreFred Tovar, Gilroy councilmember since 2016, was one of several longtime Democrats recently un-endorsed by the local Dem Party — for backing nonpartisan SCC supervisor candidate Johnny Khamis and Republican Gilroy councilmember Dion Bracco. Below, Tovar speaks with Opp Now about this troubling mission drift in the Dem Party, and how collaboration must trump polarization in local political movements. An Opp Now exclusive.
Read MoreMark Hinkle — former Libertarian Party Californian state chair and current Silicon Valley Taxpayers Association president — sat down with Opp Now to analyze drug legislation. Arguing for diminished local governance, Hinkle discusses the Libertarian perspective that all substances should be legalized, a policy stance recently rejected by Gov. Newsom. The first of an Opp Now series on Libertarian approaches to policy. An Opp Now exclusive.
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