California Senate Approves Bill That Could Jail Parents if Kids are Chronically Truant
Yesterday, the California Senate approved a bill that would hold parents responsible if their children are chronically truant. The bill would let prosecutors charge parents with misdemeanors punishable by up to a year in jail and $2,000 fine if their kids miss too much school. Chronic truancy would be defined in a separate pending bill as missing 10 percent or more of the school year without a valid excuse.
The new law would apply only to parents or guardians of children age 6 or older in kindergarten through eighth grade. Prosecutors would have to prove the parents failed to reasonably supervise and encourage the student to attend school. Judges could delay the punishment to parents as an incentive to get their children to class.
State Senator Mark Leno (D-San Francisco), said his bill, SB 317, is a public safety measure because children who do poorly in school or drop out are more likely to commit crimes. “Three-quarters of our state inmate populations are high school dropouts,” Leno said. San Francisco District Attorney Kamala Harris, who is seeking the Democratic nomination for Attorney General, sought the truancy legislation.
I strongly support parents being involved in the education of their children. I believe that it is the duty of a parent to try to instill good study habits in their kids and emphasize the importance of a good education. But I also understand reality. If a child does not want to learn, then no matter how hard the parents might try to get them to attend class and pay attention, it simply won’t work. An unmotivated child will not learn. And especially at the junior high level, a parent who is miles away at work while their child is at school will have a difficult time preventing their child from cutting class.
Putting a parent in jail for their child’s truancy will do nothing to fix the situation. If anything, it would only make things worse. With the parent in jail, who is going to watch the child? The kid will simply wind up sliding even further into the depths of society.
And for Senator Leno to equate poor school attendance with higher crime is misguided. Correlation is not the same as causation. Leno is insinuating that a lack of school attendance leads to crime. Well, I would argue that it is the poor moral character of the child that comes first. It is exactly that character defect in the child that causes them to both skip out on class and commit crimes.
Education is a privilege. The means to get an education are available and provided by the government. In order to get a proper education, it requires a willingness on the part of the student to want to learn. No matter how hard a parent tries, if the kid doesn’t want to be there, the kid will not learn anything. At that point, one has to wonder whether keeping such a student in class is even worth is. Why not allow the unmotivated student to remain separate from those who actually take their education seriously? That would mean one less distraction in the classroom for the other students and one fewer troublemaker for the teachers to have to deal with. If the parent wants to fight hard to motivate the student to turn their life around and get an education, that’s great. If not, then that’s something for that family to deal with.
The government needs to realize that not every child is cut out to be an excellent student. We need to stop wasting our energy on those who are unwilling to put forth the necessary effort to succeed in life. Instead of punishing parents for the bad decisions on the parts of their kids, we should focus on giving those who are trying their best every possible avenue to succeed.
Please visit my official campaign website at:
www.Shahab2010.com
California Assembly Votes to Give Food Stamps to Convicted Drug Felons
The California Assembly has approved a bill that would allow convicted drug felons to collect food stamps. Under the federally funded food stamps program, people convicted of drug felonies are banned from receiving food stamps after they leave prison. The California bill would not even require the convicted drug felons to prove that they are in treatment for their drug addiction. About 900 California felons could become eligible for the food stamps, costing the federal government up to $1 million.
Only in California would our elected state Legislators be willing to give food stamps to convicted drug felons. Why are the taxpayers being forced to pay to feed these horrible people? The government is already hurting for money, and we our wasting what little resources we have on the scum of society? It simply isn’t right.
Let’s vote everyone out of the State Assembly and replace them with people with some common sense.
Please visit my official campaign website at:
www.Shahab2010.com
California’s Early Release Program Frees Violent Offenders
Despite promises from state Legislators that they would exclude most dangerous prisoners from the program, inmates convicted of violent crimes are among those being freed early from California jails to save money. An Associated Press review of inmate data shows that some of the freed criminals were convicted of assault with a deadly weapon, battery, corporal injury to a spouse, inflicting injury on a child, domestic violence, attempting to take a gun from a police officer, displaying a gun in a threatening manner, and many other serious crimes.
The early release program specifically forbids authorities from freeing prisoners convicted of about 150 crimes, such as rape and murder. But any offense that is not specifically listed qualifies for release, and individual counties can then decide who gets out.
Legislators approved the early release program last year as a way to cut costs and reduce crowding in state prisons and county jails. But when the law took effect in January, the release of hundreds of inmates from local jails drew a swift backlash, especially after a Sacramento County inmate freed under the law was arrested within a day on suspicion of attempting to rape a female counselor.
At state prisons, corrections officials expect to save $500 million by granting early release to about 6,500 inmates this year. Most of those releases will not begin until later this year. The law did not provide direction to county jails about how to evaluate inmates who qualify for early release.
Now, after it is evident that violent offenders are being released from county jails early, some Legislators are trying to deal with the issue. After the attempted rape arrest in Sacramento County, the Legislature began considering amendments to the law, including a proposal to exclude county jails entirely from early release. Assemblyman Ted Lieu (D-El Segundo), who is running for Attorney General, wants to expand the list of excluded crimes. My local Assemblyman, Alberto Torrico (D-Fremont), who helped write the law and is also running for Attorney General, claims that it was never supposed to apply to counties. When it passed in September, he praised the legislation as “a smart reform package.”
Is anybody actually surprised at how badly this early release program has turned out? I was against it from the very beginning, and my concerns have been borne out. Releasing inmates early from prisons and jails cannot lead to any positive results. If anything, we need to make sure these criminals are locked up for longer periods of time, not shorter periods. These people are a cancer to society. We need to keep these people away from the rest of the population for the greater good of society.
As for those Legislators who actually believed that this early release program was a good idea, this just goes to show that many of our elected officials are complete morons. It didn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out that this was a bad plan, and yet we still had many Legislators in Sacramento who decided that this bill was good enough to vote “Yes” on. We need to remove these idiots from office this year and replace them with Legislators who have some common sense.
In the spirit of full disclosure, I am currently a candidate for State Assembly in California’s 20th District. This is the same Assembly District that is currently represented (poorly) by Alberto Torrico.
Please visit my official campaign website at:
www.Shahab2010.com
California’s Plan to Reduce Prison Crowding
Under a state law that takes effect tomorrow, California will begin to reduce it prison population. In the next year, the goal is to cut the number of inmates in prison by 6,500. The bill was signed as part of last year’s state budget package.
The bill to reduce prison crowding expands the early release credits for inmates who complete educational and vocational programs, allowing more inmates to leave prison earlier. At the same time, the state will stop the monitoring of low-level offenders after their release. The idea behind this is that it will reduce the number of parolees who have to return to prison because the state will not know if they are violating the terms of their parole.
Ex-convicts who are considered to be less dangerous or less likely to commit new crimes will not be monitored at all, although they can still be searched without a warrant. Supposedly, the reduced caseload for agents responsible for supervising parolees will let the state more concentrate more closely on watching gang members, sex offenders, and felons.
You have got to be kidding me. I am firmly against letting more criminals out of prisons early, and I am against reduced supervision of parolees. Why should criminals get out of prison early simply because they complete an educational or vocational program? Does anybody actually believe that these criminals will completely change their ways and become positive members of society? And even if they do somehow miraculously reform themselves, that doesn’t eliminate the fact that they are supposed to serve their prison sentence as a punishment for crimes they have already committed. To allow prisoners to be released early is a slap in the face of the victims of crimes.
I firmly believe that parolees must be thoroughly monitored by the state. These people have already proven in the past that they are menaces to society. Just because the state does not dedicate sufficient resources to catch them violating the terms of their parole does not mean that these people are not, in fact, doing things that should result in them losing their freedom once again. If they cannot keep their noses clean when they are released, they should be swiftly returned to prison.
California and the United States offer their citizens many opportunities to display their talents, become positive members of society, make some money by legal means, and enjoy a fulfilling life. I have no tolerance for criminals who violate the rights of others and the rules of society. I feel those who cannot follow the law and live by the rules of society should be severely punished for their actions. And even after they serve their time, these people, who have already displayed a disregard for our laws, should be closely monitored to make sure they don’t break any more laws. And if they do break the law again, we should make sure they go back to prison for a very long time.
The fact that the Legislature passed such a bill to reduce prison crowding shows that our elected officials have absolutely no clue as to how to run the state. The Legislature should enact laws that call for the harsh punishment of criminals and should ensure that the prison system has the funding to keep criminals away from the rest of society for as long as possible.
Please visit my official campaign website at:
www.Shahab2010.com