While many eyes in the North State have been fixed on the race for California’s 1st Congressional District, there’s also another major race that’s heating up in the region.
That’s for California’s 3rd Assembly District, which has long been represented by Republican Assemblymember James Gallagher.
One of the three Northern California Republicans vying for the seat is Jamie Johansson. He’s a farmer and former president of the California Farm Bureau.
In an interview with NSPR’s Claudia Brancart, Johansson laid out his plan to address some of the top issues facing residents in the district.
This interview has been edited for clarity and brevity.
For voters who are just getting to know you, what life experience or work has best prepared you to represent this region in the State Assembly?
Well, starting a farm from the ground up as a first generation farmer with no background. And agriculture in the last 30 years has gotten very technical and very complicated in terms of markets and how you market your products. So it's not only on the growing side with all the new practices that we have and regulations, but really the experience, hands-on experience of what it is to start a business in California, as well as serving on the Oroville City Council and then later on, serving as the president of the California Farm Bureau, the largest general ag organization. It's kind of a rounded education of what faces California and what faces the people of the 3rd District when it comes to being successful in California.
So what kind of farming do you do?
I farm olives and citrus.
What do you see as the main issues residents in our district are facing right now?
Well, I think the biggest thing really is accountability. Who or what, whether that's a person or legislation in Sacramento is held accountable for the fact that, when it comes to paying for energy needs, our electricity costs were double the national average, 30 cents a kilowatt hour, as opposed to around 16-17 cents nationally. Why can't we get insurance up in the foothills? And our oil prices, which we're all feeling right now, and I’m aware of the situation in Iran, but it goes beyond that, and it always has. And why are refiners pulling out of California?
Those are the accountability issues. And why are our students less than 40% testing proficient in math and less than 50% testing proficient in English, when we're spending more per student than most states here in America, and a proposed increase. How do we change that? Why is that happening? That brings back that accountability.
What would holding people accountable look like for you?
Right now you see the legislature resisting exposing a remodel going on at the Capitol now of a billion dollars, right? Not wanting to have an audit of where that money is going, why are legislators and vendors required to sign non-disclosed agreements? You can look at the high speed rail, which will never benefit us in our lifetime up here in the North State. Why did the legislature just vote to deny any sort of accountability or auditing of that system?
I think the biggest thing that we can do is get the legislature to be more involved. I think too often, and I think this comes with a dominant one party in the state, is that they don't have to hold themselves accountable to their constituents. When these boards, even the California Coastal Commission, which regulates Diablo Nuclear Power Plant, which is currently providing 10% of our energy needs in California right now, when we make a mandate like net zero energy emissions by 2045, do we fully know what the cost will be to do that? And was that the legislature's intent? And so I think it is getting the legislators more involved and wanting to be involved. But you have to be able to work across the aisle. Any bill you do, it's going to take more Democrat votes than Republican to get it through to the governor and get it done, so you have to know how to walk across the aisle.
And that's the thing about my experience in agriculture and agricultural policy, and agriculture as an industry. We're 1% of the population in California, which means a lot of people don't understand it and what we need to do to survive. You have to build those coalitions, and you have to educate. And for the North State, two out of three Angelinos depend on water coming north of the Delta. Our resources, our soil, in terms of the food that we produce, people simply don't understand. And if you go down to Los Angeles, over 30 assembly members are either all in or touch Los Angeles County, so we're outnumbered. And so when it comes to protecting our resources and our water rights, we have to be able to educate, and that certainly was my job for 14 years as an executive officer of the California Farm Bureau.
You talked a little bit about affordability being a really big issue. What would you push for in the Assembly that could hopefully make some sort of tangible difference for families here in the North State?
In the housing situation, it really is the mandates that are put on a lot of housing developments by energy efficient means to be Prop 32 compliant. I was talking to a heating and air guy, HVAC person, that when he bids out a home in terms of cost, a third of the price of what he has to charge just to put in heating and air can be related to mandates. I think even more disturbing now what you're seeing is that under Governor [Arnold] Schwarzenegger, a Republican, you saw the mandatory solar panels on rooftops. This last year, the California Air Resources Board is contemplating putting a tax on those solar panels to recover. It's just the numbers aren't working for them when it comes to recovering money for power.
You look at agriculture and the investments we've made in solar energy net metering, which is, we get the power, the extra power we produce goes back to PG&E. We get credit for it, so we don't really get a bill. They're looking at doing away with those contracts. And that simply isn't fair. You can look at oil production in California, and if we can't refine gasoline, we will be dependent on India, Singapore, South Korea, in terms of how we get our fuel to the state.
Wildfire is also a constant concern here. How would you approach the issue?
We need to build an urgency. You are either actively managing for fire, or you are actively managing for a catastrophic fire, because we know fire will come, there will be fire, and how efficiently and how quickly we can deal with it is the question. And that's proper forest management. And the urgency comes from this: In 2019 following the Camp Fire, the Butte Fire Safe Council was issued a grant by the state of California Offices of Emergency Services. They didn't get the funding for three to four years. By that time, they couldn't utilize it anymore. And it's not unusual, when you get wildfire mitigation grants, it takes three to four years to implement. That simply needs to be sped up. There's no reason for it.
As the state legislature certainly working with our congressman, whoever that may be, to reinforce a good neighbor policy at the federal level, which allows the federal government, frees up the federal government to work with state and tribes and private individuals to manage not only national forest, but also the state lands, because we know wildfires are no respecter of boundaries. And tell you the truth, environmental regulations and CEQA (California Environmental Quality Act), we see projects getting held up out of concern of one watershed, but then we see these catastrophic fires, like the Park Fire recently, or the Bear Northern Complex Fire, that wipes out hundreds of watersheds, and you know, what held up properly treating those forests?
As one of the lone Republicans, how would you plan to move in the Assembly?
I'll be a known entity. I know the people on the other side. I know the Speaker of the Assembly personally, because I've worked with him. Assemblymember Aguiar-Curry, who was just down in Colusa and Yolo County, is a Democrat. I've worked with her in terms of getting bills through. And in politics and to get anything done, people have to know you. They have to trust you, and especially in this political environment where it seems like everyone is making news, and I don't care if you're watching CNN or Fox News, there's too many politicians on there. We hear them speak, and what they say and what they do, are they trying to build a brand? Or are they trying to get something done for their constituents?
What's your message to Independents and Democrats who may be deciding how to vote or whether to vote in this race?
One of the things is to listen to the words that people say, and politicians say. A lot of promises are, “I will, I plan to,” words like that. Listen for the words that are “I have, and I can do, based on previous experience,” and I think that's what I bring. Because there are stark differences in the three candidates and what they bring.
