To restore public trust in government Californians need to know who is paying for campaigns and influencing our elected officials. California Forward thanks Secretary Padilla and Senator Hertzberg for leading the effort on upgrading and modernizing the state’s campaign finance technology, which is a critical first step to making the data easy to access.
CA Fwd has long argued for the need to increase transparency and accountability. Upgrading Cal-Access is an important first step. As a co-convener of the Political Reform and Modernization project (PRAM) to update and improve the Political Reform Act, we are delighted that a broad coalition of labor, business and good government groups agree.
We also thank Jim Heerwagen for his leadership in aligning the principles of his Public Right to Know initiative with Sen. Hertzberg’s bill. Mr. Heerwagen’s work to raise the issues and outline how to fix them has been essential to elevate and energize this “money in politics” movement. We look forward to continuing to work with him on this critically important issue.
We also pleased and proud to point out that the new initiative process designed two years ago in the Ballot Initiative Transparency Act has worked exactly as designed to align legislative solutions with important issues raised by citizens.
(Here’s the related CA Fwd report issued in 2014: “Rebooting Campaign Finance Disclosure”)
Lenny Mendonca is Co-Chair of the CA Fwd Leadership Council
