Get Used to It: Ep. 129, "A Conversation with Jackie Goldberg"

(logo squeaking and banging) (logo squeaking and banging loudly) (upbeat music) - Hi, welcome to "Get Used To It." I'm Sheila Kuehl and I help us thread our meandering journey through these shows with our wonderful guests. And today we're doing one of those "only one guest, "because she's so interesting and special" kinds of shows. And my guest today is Jackie Goldberg. Jackie Goldberg, who was a teacher, who was on the Los Angeles City School Board, who was on the Los Angeles City Council and who for the past six years has been in the California State Assembly and is now termed out. What's next, we wonder? Welcome, Jackie. - How you doing? Good to be here. - I'm doing good. I'm glad you're here. Well, let me start by asking you an open-ended question and maybe we can... I don't know, hone it a little bit, but I don't think I know of anyone more well respected in the legislature, seriously, and I've been there for 12 years. More trusted, more appreciated for telling the truth, for saying what she thinks and sometimes more fed up with the process (Jackie laughing) than you, Jackie Goldberg. So I guess my question, Jackie, is how was it? And let's have a long conversation about how it was, what you expected, what you found? - Well, I would say that the state legislature was pretty much what I thought, there were things that were better about it than I expected and things that were worst, or worse rather. The things that were better were, there was more collegiality amongst the Democrats than I thought there would be because there's a great deal of distance between us. It's not like it's a monolith. Everybody is pretty different, and we all came from very different places. Some came from local government first, others didn't. Some, we could see the ambition on their face. It was all about the next office. And other people were rooted where they were. And I found it very interesting and I enjoyed pretty much most of the people on our side of the aisle. The Republicans were a surprise because I've always been on bodies that had Republicans before, and pretty conservative Republicans, but there was a level of meanness, of nastiness of "Boy, we're gonna get you, "we're gonna drive you into the ground, "we're gonna stomp on you," that I had not experienced before. And I was a little taken aback, - Not just about you, I mean- - who are these people that, Oh no, it wasn't personal. - Right. - [Jackie] It was about anybody who wasn't them. - Right. - And a lot of them were very young and kind of adolescent in this. And it really disturbed me. I will say, over the six years that got better. That's the one thing that did get better. They didn't vote any better, but over time, some of the really nasty, mean folks actually termed out. And the ones that came after, while not great were certainly better. What else? I think the biggest surprise to me was is that the lobbyists were the constituents, not the constituents. And that when you were doing a bill, you had to get the lobbyists on both sides together. And when they all came together, then you had a bill. That was really shocking to me. It was shocking to me that so few people read the bills before they voted on it. It was shocking to me that some of them didn't read the bills before they presented them in committee and had their name on them. - Their own bills. - Their own bills. - Right. - I found that I was just... I mean, that's more (indistinct) than I've got, see, I have to go in with a bill, like I've read everything about it and know everything about it, and everything that went before it and what we hope will come after. And I assumed everybody was doing that, and when I became a chair of a committee and saw people come in and the very first question that was asked to them, they turned to the deputy and said... Or the sponsor and said, "What do we think about that?" (laughs) Whoa. So those things were surprising. On the other hand, I think that the legislature does not deserve the bad reputation it has. We do get a budget done every year in spite of the heavy partisanship, and the struggles between the House, and the Assembly and the Senate. I mean, there's all kinds of struggles. We do pass some pretty significant legislation, really every year in various areas. So I think there's a lot of stuff that's attributed... And of course Schwarzenegger doesn't help when he continuously maligns the legislature, this doesn't help. So that people think it must be true because the Governor is saying it. - Right. - But on the whole, I think that Californians should be proud of their state government. It pretty much works. It pretty much works the way it's supposed to, if we could get money out of it, that's why I'm supporting the "Clean Money" initiative. But if we could get money out of it, I think it would work even better. And that's even more important on the federal level, but it's certainly close. It's very important on the state level too. - Well, I think the issue that you were raising about people not really understanding their own bills or not really knowing in a committee what they were gonna vote on. Some of it is, yes, they haven't read it. Although the Democrats at least are on so many committees, those of us who do read the stuff, when we go from the Tuesday morning committee to the Tuesday afternoon committee and you think, "Gee, I hope my staff made a note on one or two of these because..." You don't actually have the chance to keep up with so much of it. - Yeah. - But I think term limits is a much bigger problem in the Assembly, because you're getting people who've never done this before. - Yeah. Right. - In the Senate- - Yeah, at least most of them - At least most of them, came from the Assembly. - for better or for worse were Assembly members. So at least they know what the work is gonna be. They might have chaired a committee before, but that "deer in the headlights" look that comes from not... There not being any way to be trained for it. - Yeah. - I mean, when you first started did you feel... How long, before you felt you had a real handle on what you were doing? - Well, I was very lucky. I got two staff members that had been well seasoned as my chief of staff and as my legislative director. So I would say it took me quite a while, not any quicker than anybody else, even though I'd held other offices, 'cause it's not like any other office, this is partisan, that was nonpartisan. There are 80 of you. The biggest group I had to worry about was 15. I had to get to eight that's all I had to worry about was getting to eight. Now you gotta get to 41. I mean, it's a very different situation, but I have to say that Wendy Notsinneh and Sophia Kwong saved me on a daily basis until I finally figured out what the heck was going on. And I think that's a mistake some legislators make, when they come up there, they bring up people who are friends. And I'm sorry, they may be great people, but the people who know everybody, every committee staff member, - Right. - who can call a committee staff member and say, "Hmm, I don't think that you're getting her bill." And they believe them because they've worked with them for so many years. - Right. - Two of them have worked like... One, 25 or 30 years in the building, the other, oh, was only 20 years in the building. - Well, the professional staff is really the thing that I think really saves it, especially with us cycling in and out, - Yes. - so much. - But we're losing them too. - Right. - A lot of them don't wanna stay because they know that the chair is gonna be gone in a couple of years. And they're not sure if they wanna work with that next chair or what working with that next chair will be like. So I'm finding it... Even in the short six years I was there, we lost a lot of committee staff. And it used to be, we'd lose it to the Senate. Now they're going outside to the Third House to... And I think, first of all, just on the constitutional level, there's nobody who should be able to tell me who I can vote for. And that's what term limits are, Somebody else is telling me who I get to vote for. - Well, at least they're telling you who you can't vote for. - Right. Well, that's telling me who I can vote for. - Exactly. - They're eliminating choices. - Right. - That's one problem. But the other problem is where we need term limits are on these small, little, tiny jurisdictions where a family could be there for the entire lifetime and their children then become the council members. There, there's no term limits. - [Sheila] Right. - But where the work is complicated, as it is in the state legislature, I mean, for God's sakes, California is the size of a country. Many countries, bigger than many countries. Certainly wealthier than most countries. - Right. - And it's not for amateurs to be mucking about with the laws. And yet that's exactly what we're doing. Not because we're evil or stupid, but because that's the way it is. I mean, I spent four years on "Water, Parks and Wildlife," really studying water. As something you know a great deal about now. And I was just getting pretty good on it. (laughs) And when- - Right. And now you're gone - And I'm gone. - Well, water is a very good example of what the problem is. I mean, it's funny here we are like one third of the gay caucus but we're... Essentially, this is what we do. - Yeah. - We're on... I don't know. I think I'm on nine committees. And they're not all about civil rights, many of them, as you were on Water, Parks and Wildlife and you have to deal with it. And water is one of those issues that takes quite a while to really understand the players, even where it comes from and where it goes. - Well. And things that you thought made sense to you about dams, don't make any sense for real, and what levees should look like, and don't look like. And the competition for water. And the fact that we shouldn't be growing some of the products that we grow in California, because we don't have enough water. I read an article one of the first years I was in office that said that California should not grow alfalfa, period. Just shouldn't do it. And that if we didn't do it, even if we subsidized all of the people who need it for the farm animals for feed, even if we paid all of the people to not grow it, to grow something else, it would still be cheaper than what it costs us to try to deal with having enough water to take care of alfalfa. There's just no reason for... Much less rice, - Right. And we're one of the major producers of rice in the world. Doesn't make any sense. - It really doesn't when half the state is a desert or more than half of it. - Really - That we're already bringing water into. - Right. - Well substantively, I don't think people mostly know that every member of the Assembly and every member of the Senate, and that totals 120 people, can bring... What, 40, 50 bills in a two year session. - Yeah. - What was the focus for you? I know there wasn't only one, but sort of the area, because we all kind of tend to focus and not be too scattered. What was the focus that you brought or worked with in the Assembly? - First of all, we in our office took the position early on that if there's someone else who wants to carry this piece of legislation, they should. And that what we should be doing is carrying things that nobody would touch with a 10 foot pole. (Sheila laughing) And the reason is really quite simple. First of all, I have a district that was tremendously supportive of me, so I could get away with things that people are going... - Just for people who are watching in other states. - Yeah. - And there are a bunch, and even up north. Say a little bit about what your district was in L.A. - My district is the flat lands of Hollywood, therefore not the money. Echo Park, Silver Lake, Highland park, Mount Washington, let's see... El Sereno, City Terrace. - So it extended from the middle of the, - Chinatown. - west part of the city from Downtown. Over towards Downtown. - Center-west, up through the Northeast part. It changed a little, while I was in office. I lost Silver Lake, mostly. I lost Eagle Rock. - From redistricting. - From redistricting. and I lost Boyle Heights, which I truly loved, - Yeah. - but what can you do? But it's primarily a Latino district about 80% Latino, not just a Mexican American, but really heavily Central American as well. Have the largest Thai community, the largest Chinese community, part of the Korean community. I have a large Armenian community. First generation Armenian community. Have just a tremendous, diverse... New immigrants to Mexican American families that have been here for four generations. - The perfect district for a White, Jewish lesbian. - (laughs) Right on. - (laughs) How'd you do that? - Well, I started out in the school board and we developed a relationship. The fact of the matter is, is that a lot of people think that there's a lot of racism amongst people of color. They're anti-White or they hate whites or something like that. That is about an inch deep. What they really wanna know is, "Are you with me or you're against me?" - Right. - "If you're with me, "I'm your friend. "I don't care what your..." 'Cause I've run against Latinos in this district and beat them. But I beat them because I was a known quantity that did look out for my district. And my district's pretty low-income has a little middle-class, but it's pretty low-income. And I had a 22 year relationship with these folks. And people in my district until recently, didn't move much, they had an apartment or they had a little home and they stayed in it. And their children grew up in it and their children stayed in the neighborhood or stayed in it. So it was fairly stable before the end of the military-industrial complex, which really fed the economy of Southern California and particularly Los Angeles. The area was actually a little better off because these folks were not working in aircraft industry, but they were in small tool and dye shops, making pieces for the pieces that made the aircraft industry. And so while they weren't in unions, for the most part, they were stable, pretty well paid with benefit jobs that required some skill. And it was a pretty stable community for the most part. Well then, boy, all up for grabs. And now of course with the housing market boom, people are being forced out of neighborhoods that two or three generations of their family have lived in. It's really awful. This gentrification is really awful in my area and it's making it impossible for people to find any place to live. They're going further and further east, or they're going up into Antelope Valley. They're (indistinct) long commutes. They don't have cars. So they're taking these long commutes on trains and they're having a hard time. Healthcare used to be not a big issue in the district. Now it's probably the number one issue in the district. - Well, I interrupted you because you were saying, "My district is so good. - Yeah. - "I could virtually do anything I wanted. "And the bills that we decided to carry were the bills that..." As you put it, "No one else would touch with a 10 foot pole." - Right. - Which means, a bill that really wants to kick the can down the street. - So I did things that I loved, which were education bills, most of which were vetoed by both Democrats and Republicans, which annoyed me. Because neither of those governors, frankly, knew a lot about education. And I actually knew quite a bit about education. So that's my biggest disappointment is that we've changed almost nothing in the insane way we're doing public education in California and in the country really. It's all been captured by right wing think tanks and it's really dreadful. But then I did a lot of things that had to do with workers' rights and workers' needs and necessities. I tried to do some things in the prison reform stuff. Most of which I couldn't even get a 41 vote bill on, but that's because they knew the governors were going to veto them and they didn't want to stand up for them. Even if it wasn't gonna get passed. - Right. - That was a disappointment too, that people weren't willing to vote what they believed on certain issues, not all. I'm not cynical about them. I think actually, I was more favorably impressed than I expected to be with the people there. - People were stretching - - People stretch, but on not on criminal justice, man. I'm telling you, - No, it's not on criminal justice. It's like being soft on communism, you're soft on crime. Well, who's soft on crime? Nobody is soft on crime. There are no pro crime lobbies. - There really aren't. - And we're paying the price for it in terms of overcrowding of the prisons, - Right. - Non-violent offenders being put in prison- - For longer and longer times. - Well, and phony-baloney looks at "reform" of the prisons. - [Jackie] I know. - This plan that we got last year was nothing. - I know. Well, that was actually one of the disappointments about Schwarzenegger. I had no illusions. I knew he was not who he said he was in his campaign, but at least people who had known him, who talked to me said, "You watch, he's gonna change the prisons, "'cause he as a weightlifter..." 'Cause weightlifting's a big thing in prison. - Right. - "Often met ex-cons. "Who would tell them what prison was like. "And that he was gonna do something." And I actually believed it. And there for about two minutes, I think he thought he was gonna do it. And then his advisors got a hold of him. This is my opinion. I have no proof of this and said, "This is not good for your reelection campaign. "And you better not do the things that you set out to do." 'Cause I actually think he wanted to change things. I really do. - Well, I think that's been the case in a number of places. But one of the problems that I have seen in his administration is that he will have an idea, but because of his total lack of experience, turning an idea into a legislative action or something in the law, when he's faced with the realities of what that would mean, and people start giving him negative feedback about it. It's almost like he hasn't thought of it. - Yeah. - He didn't know it was gonna cause such a problem. - Right. - So it's better not to do it. I mean Pavley's bill on greenhouse gas is the best is the best example. - Yeah. Right. - He wanted to do something about global warming. - Fights it, and fights it, - And then takes credit for it. - And then takes credit for it, really, what a guy. - I know. But I mean I think he really sincerely said, "Global warming. - Yeah. - "Yeah. I think we should do something about it." - Yeah. I do too. - And then when the details of anything are presented to him, it's like to do something about global warming, you have to put a cap on what people are emitting. You have to make it mandatory, not voluntary. - [Jackie] Right. - There has to be some consequences. - Right. - Well, businesses went nuts. Big businesses anyway. - Yeah. Right. And he said, Oh... it was like, he didn't know. - Right. - That in order to do something about global warming, you had to make some rules about it. - Well, I think the same thing with the prison reform. - Exactly. - He didn't know that the people who were gonna have to change wouldn't like it and would get really mad at him (laughs). - [Sheila] Yeah. That's really hard for a governor that just wants to be really popular. - I know. - Well, but we all like to be popular, the truth is. - It's true, everybody does. - And you say, you have a great district. That's really one of the things I'm also grateful for, is that you can go out on a limb for a principle, not just to make points with somebody, but principle. I think that your thought of as one of the more principled or most principled people in the legislature. And that's not as rare as people think. I mean, there would be a struggle about them, who is the principled person. - Oh yeah. Well, there are a lot of principled people. - Absolutely. But I think we do have permission from our districts who care about the human factor. - Right. - My district is well enough off to be able to wanna support it. Your district, it's even more heroic because a lot of them are working day to day. - [Jackie] Yep. - And have a lot to worry about. - Oh yeah. It's a struggle in my district these days, more so than when I started 20 years ago, - An economic struggle. - Yeah. It's a big economic struggle. And also all this anti-immigrant stuff. Well, if you're Latino... The idiots who spread this vitriol, they don't care if you're really an immigrant or not. They're really anti-Latino. - Right. - Because that number is too big and scary, and maybe it'll take over something they wanted to take hold onto. And so they say immigrant, but they mean Latino. And believe me, Latinos in my district know that, and so do the Thais, and so do the Chinese, and the Vietnamese, and the Cambodians, and the Laotians. We don't have too many Hmong, but that's in Northern California. But they all know that it's a buzzword for a racist attack. - Well, and of course, whatever the immigration group has been. - [Jackie] Yeah. - There's always been pushback. - Oh yeah. - I mean, our relatives certainly got some pushback back. - [Jackie] Oh yeah. - John Steinbeck's last book was called "America and the Americans." And I don't know if it's a very widely-read book. - [Jackie] I haven't read it. - But in it he had a chapter about... It was kind of about immigration. And he started out the chapter by saying, I bet the first guy that jumped off the Mayflower on to Plymouth Rock turned around and said, "Okay, this is my country. "The rest of your foreigners, go home." - [Jackie] Yeah. Really. - And I think it's a point. - Right, - Because every wave really participates in turning around and saying, "I have mine, but I don't want all these other new people-" - Well, "NINA," that was the sign at the turn of the century, "No Irish Need Apply." And in the Midwest, - Right. - they just wrote the letters, N-I-N-A, and put it in the window of the store or the business. - [Sheila] Right. - So it's been really, every group's... The problem is, is that people have short-term memory loss. They don't remember that it happened to them. And that in fact it was... The immigrants, really are everybody here. There's really no one here who wasn't an immigrant, we even believe the Native Americans walked across the Bering Straight from Asia for God's sakes. (Sheila laughing) But I think that's been really disturbing and hard for the people that I represent, this newest wave and this newest attack, because they know darn well that it isn't just immigrants or immigrants without papers that are really under assault. - Well, and it's an issue for the legislature in various ways. - Right. - Not only Gil Cedillo's bill about driver's licenses. - [Jackie] Right. - Just in the last couple of weeks of session, when Deb Ortiz was talking about how some counties were saying, they could not serve people, - Yeah. - who were undocumented in their emergency rooms. - Right. - And of course, that's completely antithetical to the language of money that's given for emergency services. - [Jackie] Right. - And she tried to get an affirmation that it was okay to use that money. And people were peeling off like, I don't know what... Rats off a ship or something. - Yeah. Rats off a ship. - (indistinct) I don't know if I can vote for that. It's because something is made an issue like that. - Right. - And people run away. Some people run away from it. - Yeah. - So that's a disappointment. - Yeah. - I mean, what you learn about people in your own party. - Yeah. - And it wouldn't mean that I don't like Democrats, or I don't wanna be a Democrat anymore, but you wonder why people don't have more courage. - [Jackie] Yeah. - Well, you know they're gonna get reelected. - I think I find that the hardest to understand in places like Sacramento. Where first of all, the chances of your constituents knowing what you did anyway is almost zero. I mean, I think that's terrible, but it's true. - Right. - I mean, I just read a major metropolitan newspaper here, in Los Angeles. (Sheila laughing) with their cap, as summary of the... They called it a scorecard. Did you see that article? And what was it about maybe 10 bills out of 1,100 or 1,200 that were signed? - And that's what people think we did. - That's what we did all year was those 12 or 15 bills, and some of 'em weren't even particularly important bills, - Right. - That they picked to talk about as opposed to some of them that were. So it's a secret what we do up there anyway. - Well, it's the same thing about the vetoes. - [Jackie] Yeah. - Because I think where people say, "Oh, well the governor signed that" or "The governor signed that." Somewhere, there has gotta be a really public list. - [Jackie] Yeah. - Of all the environmental bills that he killed. - Oh right. And all the human rights bills that he killed and all- - All the education bills that he changed, yeah. Or killed, yeah. - [Sheila] Where there could have been some real change, - Yeah. - in this state. - Right. - Necessary change. And the process that we go through, it's a very exact- - Yeah. It is. - I can't have a thought and bring a bill and it becomes the law. - Right. - And it is lobbyists, but lobbyists have another name sometimes, which is advocates. - Yeah. - I mean, lobbyists to me are the people who get paid to do it. But even the advocates are lobbying. - Right. No, it just never... That particular part of it was, it just never occurred to me how big their role was. - [Sheila] Yeah. - I'd been lobbied plenty in city council, but it's usually about a project that they wanted you to vote for the entitlements for or something. It wasn't about taking the landlord's side against the tenants again. - Right. Or not supporting some consumer protection that would make people safer when they use products. I remember breaking into tears one evening (laughs). What can I tell you. - (laughs) I know you and I both cried more on this job- - (indistinct) about anything else. But Gloria Negrete Mcleod, about four years ago had a small bill, because there had been a rash of swimming pool deaths. And her small bill said that before a house with a pool was sold, you had to do one... And she had a list of like 50 things. The most expensive of which was to put a pool cover with an electric lock on it and blah-blah-blah. The least expensive of which was to buy, for about eight or 10 bucks at a hardware store, a latch that you put on any door that leads near to the pool, that rings when the door is opened. And I priced it. It was about $10 or $12. And if you couldn't do it yourself, it was maybe $25 more to have someone put it on for you. Although it really was just a couple of screws. And I was listening to the debate. And as we were talking, there are these lobbyists who do these floor alerts, who get a member to say, "Hand this out to everybody." And so the real estate folks... California Real Estate Association handed out something that said, kill this bill. It'll cost tens of thousands of dollars to do this. It'll cost increase the price of home. It's a bad bill. And I stood up and I said, "Well, hold it. "I actually went and priced "the least expensive thing you could do "and meet the entire requirement of this bill. "And it was... "If you did it yourself, about 15 bucks, "if you needed help, maybe it was 40, okay. "And it would save children's lives." I mean, $40, a child's life, seems to me, a no brainer. Everybody's shaking their head. That bill died. Now we had 50 Democrats at the time. We had more than nine Democrats who wouldn't vote for that bill. I burst into tears. Wasn't even my bill, but I thought my God, that the California Real Estate Association had so much pull on people, that them saying, "Don't vote for this." When we're talking about $40 and a child's life, Just blew me out of the water. - Well, I was very disappointed at the courage quotient. - [Jackie] Yes. - In the Assembly, somewhat more. The funny thing about being in the Senate with the 40 of us, and how we're so closely aligned, all the Dems on one side, 25. It's harder in a way to say no, because- - Yeah. I can tell. So many of the things I thought were just disgusting bills that you guys sent over, (Sheila laughing) had unanimous votes. How could that possibly be? - I beg your pardon. What do you mean disgusting bills? We're not sending disgusting bills. We might hope that you are gonna clean them up a little bit. I mean, people say, "Well, what do you think about a bicameral legislature?" I mean, is it a good thing to have two houses? And I have to say, I've never experienced a legislature with only one house. Maybe you are more self-correcting. But when we do the bills and we start hearing them right away, right after they're introduced, we have our first analysis and we think, "Well, this is a work in progress "because (indistinct) first committee is, - Right. - "so let's keep shaping it "because the idea is okay and it's there and whatever." And so by the time it gets over to you. - [Jackie] Yeah. And the same in reverse. - But you're right. It is disappointing. I wanna talk a little bit more about education from that point of view, - Okay. - or any point of view you want. But let's start with that. I mean, everybody thinks they have an idea about education. - [Jackie] 'Cause they went to school (laughs). - They went to school that makes them an expert. - Absolutely. - Or they have kids in school. - And that makes 'em even a greater expert. - So they get to the legislature and they want to do something about education. Now, mostly everybody means the same thing, Dems and Reps. They want to improve education, as they see the improvement. And people have a lot of different ideas about what that means. And then it's very fractured, but you were the chair of the education committee, the notion being maybe some of that can come together into some kind of reform. What was your experience in seeing anything happen for education? - Nothing happened for education that was very good. The truth of the matter is we've never had a serious discussion, at least not in recent times about what the purpose of education is anyway. And that's overdue because we have... The 20th century version was to get people off the farm and ready for factories. Factories gone, farms are gone, now what do we do? We had "Prepare the people to work on assembly lines." And you can tell that schools were designed to do that in the 20th century because we cared about tardies more than we cared about almost anything. I mean, you got one little line for your grades, for each class, for each secondary student, one little line. You got a letter grade, you got a grade for how much effort they put out. And then how many times they were absent and how many times they were late. Not in the seat when the bell rings, you are? - Late. - See, everyone knows the rules. (Sheila laughing) Why? Assembly line couldn't start unless everybody was in their seat. Now that's just not true in the modern workplace. In the modern workplace it almost doesn't matter at all what time you get there or what time you leave, you have a certain amount of work that has to be done. It's not done any more alone. It's done in groups and work groups. We do nothing in schools in work groups except at the very most expensive private schools. And so students, no matter what they're going into, a profession or just a job, have no experience in problem solving. We don't ask them to do any problem solving. We don't ask them to look at the whole picture. We don't ask them to become lifelong learners because the reality is they're not going to be in the same job forever. That job isn't going to even exist in a few more months or years. - Which is why they need to be lifetime learners. - Exactly. - Right. - We don't discuss any of that. We don't talk about oral communication. In fact, if you talk to me and I talk to you, that's cheating. I'm gonna get a big red F on my paper if I problem solve with you about something. So there's this total disconnect between the contemporary workplace and schools. Now that happened last century too, but they were commissions and people studied it. And there were conversations. The "Ladies' Home Journal" started the conversation about what should 20th century schools be like in 1913 with some articles that are wonderful, that I use all the time to get people to think, maybe we should do that again now. But we're not. It's like we're in the process in California, and really in most of the country, we're this close to perfecting the very best 20th century school system. We're very close. But the problem is it doesn't fit the needs of the society. It doesn't make people questioning and conscientious participators in the public life, in the public dialogue. It doesn't make them ready to be able to learn new skills. It doesn't make them able to work in small work groups. I've been meeting a lot in the last three or four years with Orange County, San Diego County and L.A. County business groups, because I feel very strongly that they have a role to play that they're not playing in this dialogue. And I've been agitating them to get involved. And they all tell me the same thing. They don't really care too much, what skills the kids come out of from school. Can they communicate with other people? Are they honest and not gonna cheat, or lie, or steal? Can basically read and write? And do they have some sense of how to go about looking at a problem and solving it? - Well, but there's been a cross-purpose issue that's come in, especially since 1994, when there was a revolution in, who was elected to the Assembly, when the Republican party became ultra-conservative, in terms of the people that it was sending to the legislature. Now that's no excuse since we've been in the majority since 1996. - Yep. - But the drum beat really has been for the dumbing down, - Yep. - of education. - Totally. - And they sound like they care about what business wants. - They don't at all. - But none of the skills that you're talking about, - No. - are ever even considered, why- - And we don't test them. And now if you don't test it, nobody cares about it at all. - No, but that sort of creative thinking, - Yep. - that's a dangerous thing, - Right. - if you want people simply to do what they're told. - Well, we've tracked it back. Not me personally, but the people I read, and it comes out of the "Heritage Institute." It comes out of the "Hoover Institute." There are, in the curriculum commission of the State of California. I think we got maybe 11 or 13 members, two of them are from the Hoover Institute. Okay. These are ideological organizations who have a particular point of view that children only need to know math and English. That's it. Reading and math. They don't need to know anything else. Oh, excuse me. Well, maybe, eventually they need to do a little science. I think science may turn out to be kind of important to them, but that's about for the mass of education. And not only do they just need to read and do math, but it's finite skills. It's not math analysis where you actually begin to use the mathematics to describe what the world is like. It's 3 times 4 is 12. And factoring a polynomial.... Well, I don't know. I've done a lot of things in my life. And since I've left high school and college, I've never really had one time, been required to factor a polynomial. But it's on the exit exam of the State of California. And if you can't... 19% of the jobs in California, 19% of the jobs require any algebra at all. Any at all. That means 81% do not. Yet every student has to take algebra. I actually think every student should attempt algebra. I just don't think they should have to master it to graduate from high school. And the reason they should have to is because it is good for your intellectual capacity. It is a problem solving device. If you can get it, it's fine. But if you can't get it, why are we going to agitate you? And why will we do this to eighth graders when they're probably not even mature enough to deal with it? The ones who are ready, absolutely give it to 'em in the sixth grade, there are sixth graders ready for algebra. - But part of the problem- - But it's one size fits all. - One size fits all. But part of the problem is how to do it the other way. I mean really, how to accomplish it the other way, because you say, what business is saying is they want the ability to make decisions, decision making skills. They want some analytic kind of skills, which are good life skills as well. But in order to generate that... That's been sort of a lot of the argument because it seems to be so much more difficult to figure out how you generate those skills rather than testable skills of 4 times 3 is 12. - Actually, that's not really true. It really isn't. Because you look around yourself, everything is a problem to solve. If you're a poor kid getting to and from school without getting yourself killed is problem solving. We got kids making big decisions every single day, accurate ones, 'cause they're getting back to and from school. Kids are actually pretty good problem solvers. The problem is, is that we don't involve them in making decisions. I go on the websites. You can tell, I have a bizarre life, but I go on websites of states and look at their exit exams or look at whatever they have about testing. And Connecticut... One of your choices, you've got four or five ways to pass the math part of their exam. One of their choices is to work in a small group and to solve a problem. Well, what are the problems? They have lots of little townships that have infrastructure problems. And so they give them information and they say to them, "Okay, what's the most elegant solution "to figuring out how to get this sewer line repaired?" Not the technical part of digging it up and doing it, but "Would you be better off "because if you use this type of material, "you're gonna have to dig it up in 20 years "and it's gonna cost this much. "Would you be better off if you use this better material "which lasts almost forever? "Would you be better off making them small?" And they present it in writing and all of them get the same pass or fail. And I've told that to people out here and they said, "How do they know one person didn't do it "and the four people cheated?" And I said, "Because they need the whole team "to get the answer. "Everybody's gotta be involved or it isn't gonna work." "Oh, well I've gotta worry about cheating." Well, I'm sorry. The truth of the matter is how do you know in a work team who's doing the work? You don't. The fact of the matter is is you got a good work group. Everybody contributes what they can, and well, if Connecticut can figure out how to do that, I mean, just think of the City of Los Angeles, the problems we could give kids to work on. - Well, the standardized testing has been a problem. that I've heard from parents. - It's huge problem. - A lot of 'em. - [Jackie] It's outrageous. - They don't get why this is what has to be done. It seems like a fool's way through. And teachers are very upset about it as you know. - Yeah. - Because they teach to the test. - Testing in maybe fourth or fifth grade, and eighth grade and maybe 11th grade gives you a picture, a snapshot. And I would advocate that. Once in elementary, once in middle and once in high school. So that you get some idea of how close to your goal of having kids meet standards in the curriculum. This yearly testing is insane. Starting in second grade. Now I've ended it. Now I'm gone. I'm leaving it in your hands to make sure they don't bring it back the minute I'm not there. - And hat was a tough fight. - Oh, it was a huge fight. But second grade testing isn't even required by "No Child Left Behind." - Right. - And second grade testing... See the problem with testing, the way we do it, holding people up to shame. You're a failing school. That means the teachers feel bad. The parents feel bad. The kids feel bad. There are no failing schools. There are schools where the kids are struggling to make achievement. And we haven't invested enough in those schools to make it possible for them to meet those high standards. The failure is in Sacramento in not sending them enough money and giving them enough leeway to do something about the problems, not the failure... There are no failing schools, there really aren't. And that whole business, what it does is it means nobody wants to go into teaching. So where are you gonna get the next generation of teachers? It means, we have for the first time in the history of education in this state, teachers retiring at 61, and 62 and 63. Now you have to understand the way the state teachers retirement system's set up. You don't wait till you're 65, you lose big bucks forever. So they're fleeing when they retire at 61 and 62, we are losing almost half of all of the beginning teachers before they have taught for five years, and everybody's running around saying, "Stay the course. We got a perfect system." How could it be a perfect system if no one wants to teach in it? - Absolutely right. - How could it be a perfect system? - And yet the teachers are the heroes of life. - Really, truly. - I mean, you were a teacher and you certainly knew it up close and personal. - [Jackie] Ah, that's the best job I ever had. - I think so. Are you gonna teach again? - I'm toying with it. Yeah, I really am. - Well, of course everybody's saying to me, because you're the first member of the LGBT Caucus to graduate. - Yes. - So we're all being asked, the other five of us and probably a lot of other people, what's Jackie gonna do? - Well, I'm gonna be in K-12 education, that I know. I just don't know what yet. There are some things that I might want to do. I've considered asking... Let me back up a step. One of the issues that we have never taken... People always wanna say, well, how come... The correlation if this is a chart and this is a family income, and this is a ach... No, this is family income and this is achievement. "How come it's like a one to one correlation?" And the answer isn't that... I know, you know this. That poor people are less intelligent than affluent people. It's that people don't realize how much middle-class and up provides in a way of what I call the middle-class subsidy to the public schools, your kid's behind, you have both the time and the money to get them to tutor. You may even be able to tutor them yourselves. If a kid needs something to keep them excited about school, you'll give them music lessons, or take them to sports clubs, or to a gym. You travel with them and they learn vocabulary. You read to them, you have both the time and the income to do this. Okay. So you got low-income kids, this is not happening for them. So the big problem is language development. Now the idiots have decided that that means we have to have phonemic awareness, but it's really vocabulary. And it's vocabulary for low-income kids every bit as much as for English language learners, and in middle school is where the crash occurs. - [Sheila] Right. - Because when you get to middle school, for sure... Upper elementary, some, but for sure by middle school, you are now having to learn academic English. If you have a very stable, excellent English vocabulary, when you're 11 or 12 years old, which most middle-class children do, you don't realize it, but you're picking up academic English from the teacher automatically by just listening to him or her teach. If you don't, it's like put your fingers in your ears as far down as you can get them and see what you can figure out about what someone who's speaking the same language you were saying, it's like a mumble. And so what we need to do is to figure out how to deal with this academic English problem. And it isn't just teaching them academic English. - Right. - It has to be experiential. So of course, what do we do? We cut out all the field trips because they're too expensive. We don't let them participate in music or English... I mean, music or art, we don't let them participate in science or social studies. Do you know if you're an English language learner or a low-income African American kid in California, you can go for five years and have only math and English all day long for five years. And we wonder why they're a little bit unhappy with the school system. - Well, the other thing that you were saying about family income, and academic achievement, - Right. - and how they go hand in glove. One of the other things I think looking at the other side of the spectrum is that when you're from a low-income family, and I grew up over by the Coliseum, over by Downtown, L.A. When you're in a low-income family, especially today, many of the kids, even the youngest kids are working. - Yeah, absolutely. - And they have to work and they work late. - Absolutely. - They don't get enough sleep. They don't really have the ability to do homework. - Right. - 'Cause they go right from school to work. (indistinct) they work really late. If they get five hours sleep, they're lucky. They get up, they're struggling to go to school. But it's like, Jesse Jackson said, talking about equality. You can draw a line at the beginning of a race and say, well, everybody's starting from that line. But if this kid's got weights on his ankles, - Right. - It's not an equal race. - [Jackie] No. - And you have to take into account what those weights are. I don't know that we can solve it, but it's related to economics too. - Well, we can solve a lot of it. We can't solve all of it, but we can solve a lot of it. If you wanted to change the academic achievement of California kids. Poor kids. The first two things you would do is guarantee them healthcare. And the second thing is, you'd raise the minimum wage to about 15 bucks an hour. You did those two things. - So livable, not just minimum wage. - Yeah. - Right. - [Jackie] But it would be the minimum wage. - Right, I understand. - If you did those two things, you would overnight change the academic achievement. You wouldn't have to pay all this money for figuring it out that no studies... And then the third things are you would work on language development for low-income kids. There is now research, really excellent research that says, that a youngster from a very low-income family at age three and four knows about 47% of the words of a kid from a professional family. Family where one or both parents are in a profession. By the time they finish first grade, that gap is now about... They know about 35 or 30... I can't remember the number, 30 or 35%. In other words, - It drops. - they've been in school, they get further away. - Right. - Because the kids who come to school, knowing enough English to learn new words just by listening, by being in the classroom are learning vocabulary without even knowing it. And these other kids don't have enough vocabulary to learn the new words. And so the gap widens as we go along. And that's why you asked me one of the things I wanna do. I maybe wanna work on a middle schools project if L.A. Unified will let me do that with a wonderful woman, a professor at Berkeley, Lily Wong Fillmore. Who's been studying this for a long time. And I'd like to see if they'd give me a little money to have her come down and let me work with some teachers, and some parents, and some folks in the upper elementary grades in the middle schools to see if we can fashion a academic language development program, that by the time kids get to high school, they have gotten enough academic English to maybe take advantage of the high schools. Why are so many kids dropping out? Dropping out, 'cause they don't have the first frigging idea what everybody's talking about when they talk to them. It's like me, you give me a physics book and I can read every word that's written in English. But if someone says to me, "Okay, summarize what you just read." - No comprehension. - Duh, you know what? - [Sheila] Right (indistinct). - And then give it to me in French and I'm dead. - Right. - So here we're giving it to 'em in their second language and the concepts are difficult, even if it's your first language and we didn't, by the way, give you any background while you were growing up so that you'd have pegs to hook that language on. And then we're just shocked that they're dropping out in such large numbers. And that's not going to change until we do something about academic English. - The other issue that we've dealt with over the years about schools, and it's been an interesting intersection for me, is what we have come to refer to as "School Safety." - Yeah. - And we started out talking about not just gay and lesbian kids. - Right. - But, the broader group of kids who are thought to be gay or lesbian, so they're beat up anyway, whether they're straight or not. - [Jackie] Right. - And the oppressive atmosphere. Talk about walk... I mean, it's more difficult for kids having to walk through gang territory and get back alive. - Yeah. - I don't question that, but just the safety in schools of our kids. - [Jackie] Oh yeah. And our kids have a hard time. - [Sheila] And it led to- - And there's this whole business about that's so gay, and all this other stuff is put down to anything that's so gay. - But it seemed like the right wing went cuckoo bananas. - [Jackie] Yeah. - Whenever there would be anything about our community, - Yeah. - and schools. - [Jackie] Well that's because we were recruiting. - Of course. - And I kept telling to them, (Sheila laughing) this is the most difficult recruiting that any group has ever had. You have- - [Sheila] Let's hear the recruiting poster. - You have no legal rights on the federal level whatsoever. It's actually legal to discriminate against you. It's legal for you to not be able to adopt children. It's legal for you not to have any benefits from social security. it's legal for people to hate you. It's legal and acceptable. It's considered freedom of speech for them to say that you're a pervert and that there's something seriously wrong with you, and that you're going to burn in hell. This is a very difficult group to recruit new people into. - It's true. And no wonder none of the recruiting posters have worked. - I know, we got them up everywhere. - [Sheila] Come be discriminated against. - Right (laughs). Be hated by your family and your church. - But one of the bills of course, that you'll be greatly remembered for. - Yeah. - And I won't say mostly because there've been a number of very good things, but it really has to do with the Domestic Partners bill. - Yeah. That was a big moment for me. - Because Carol Migden, - No doubt about it. - started this out. - Started it out. - Establish the ability that we would have to register as domestic partners. And I think we had four rights at the beginning. - [Jackie] Yeah. - You could go visit your partner in a hospital room, - Right. - et cetera. - Which was an important right to me because I had surgery before that happened. And my partner had to go through a lot for her to be able to make decisions for me. - But tell me about that bill and how that felt? - Yeah. Well, that was quite an experience. And first of all, I think we need to say very clearly that the whole LGBT Caucus was involved in that bill, not just me. And a whole bunches of people who are not in our community, who were legislators were... I mean, I can't tell you how many straight legislators came up to me and said, "Well, now I've been talking to this one "and I think I've just got them there." So this really was an effort of a lot of people. I had the joy and the difficulty of being the shepherd finally to doing it, but I certainly could never have done it if it was not for all of the folks who came forward and all the people. - [Sheila] (indistinct) proud of themselves. - All of you out there who wrote letters... And there were just amazing things, legislators standing up and talking about a gay brother or a gay sister, or talking about gay children that they had, that none of us knew about. It was really quite remarkable. It really was quite a remarkable thing. And the speeches were the kind... I mean, I actually had my staff tape them because people were literally shining at their very best at this time. - Well, that is an interesting thing we've become... And I wanna warn you, I think I have a three minute warning here, so, - Okay. - I'm gonna give you two minutes to say anything you want at the end of this but... We became the way by which people had an opportunity to stand up for something, like we felt in the civil rights movement. - [Jackie] Yes. Oh yes. - And it became a very important statement, - Yeah. - for many of our members. - [Jackie] Oh yeah. And people stretch... Talk about people stretching. - [Sheila] Well, on the Marriage bill, too. - People who were not in districts where this was going to be, and this was going to be reported, how they voted. - [Sheila] Right. - So a lot of people really stood up and said, "I'm gonna be counted on this one." And so it was really quite an extraordinary... I will not never forget when it passed our house. I will never forget it. - Well we were watching over in the Senate. - Yeah. - And you were just so joyful. - Yeah. - And it's interesting because it wasn't really about us. - [Jackie] Yeah. No, it isn't. - I don't even have a domestic partner. And I just felt like it was such a great day. - Yeah. It felt wonderful. And it felt like it was the culmination of the efforts of our whole community. I mean, thousands of people who don't write letters to their government wrote letters to their government on this piece of legislation. And that's a good message. People need to know that, they need to know that those letters make a difference, and that they need to be writing them because it really did make a difference. There were a lot of legislators who told me how many people from their district came into their office and said, "Please do this." And that it gave them a little strength. - Still though, it was one of the nicest days of my life when got to marry you and Shannon. - [Jackie] Yeah. That was fun. We liked that. - That was great. Just for a shining moment in San Francisco. - Yeah. I think we got three or four months (Sheila laughing) before it was all ripped part. - [Sheila] I don't think it's over. I don't care what the- - Oh, I don't think it's it's over. Oh, look, it's not over because people are out. And the only way you can really keep our community down is for people not to think that they know anybody who's gay. - Right. - I mean, that's the truth. And now, not only do people think that they work alongside people who're gay. They now know that Aunt Betty didn't get married for a reason, and neither did uncle Sam. And so, it's in the... We're everywhere, in your family, in your workplace, in your church, in synagogue and mosque. - Well, I have to tell you, it was my great pleasure serving with you on the legislature - Yeah, mine too. - It was selfish. I mean, that's why I wanted you to do it so that you would be there. And I thank you on behalf of everybody whose lives you've touched. And I want you all, - Thank you. - to remember Jackie Goldberg, 'cause she's gonna continue to do great stuff. I want you to take her as one of your personal heroes. I want you to think about running for office. - [Jackie] Yep. - I want you to be active and I want you to get used to it. (upbeat music)