Pols 111 ch 9
In April 2016, Governor Brown signed a landmark bill that promised to increase the state's hourly minimum wage every year for the next seven years. Under this law, the state's minimum wage in 2023 will be how many dollars per hour?
$15 (The increased minimum wage rules will take effect gradually, increasing $.50 to $1 each year for small and large businesses, and reaching $15 by 2022 for larger businesses and 2023 for smaller businesses.)
Place the average levels of voter turnout for different kinds of elections in order from lowest to highest.
-The average voter participation rate is uncontested, one- candidate mayoral elections -The average voter participation rate in competitive, two-candidate mayoral elections -The state of California's average voter participation rate in recent presidential elections -The national average voter participation rate in presidential elections
How many years are the terms of members of county boards of supervisors?
4 (Members of county boards of supervisors are elected by districts for staggered four-year terms.)
What was the so-called devolution revolution?
A movement led by federal and state authorities during the 1970s to delegate more responsibility to local governments
Match the appropriate type of regional government with each state agency.
Advisory regional government -Association of Bay Area Governments -Southern California Association of Governments Regulatory regional government -South Coat Air Quality Management District -California Coastal Commission
Which of the following is the most common form of county government in California?
An elected five-member board of supervisors (In all counties except San Francisco, an elected five-member board of supervisors controls the governing process.)
Which of the following is the best description of councils of government (COGs)?
COGs are assemblies of delegates representing a region's counties and cities who meet to discuss common problems (COGs mainly perform research, planning, and advisory functions and have little or no power or authority to impose their decisions on local jurisdictions.)
Which of the following statements about the process of municipal incorporation in California are accurate?
Correct -A petition for municipal incorporation must be submitted to the county's LAFCo. -The county's LAFCo engages in an extensive review of all incorporation plans. Incorrect -The process of municipal incorporation is not finalized until the state legislature and governor approve the incorporation plan. -Residents of the affected area are allowed to testify at any government hearing regarding the incorporation but are not allowed to directly vote on the incorporation plan.
In addition to the board of supervisors, identify the other elected or appointed county officers required by general law.
Correct -A sheriff -An assessor -A district attorney Incorrect -A superintendent of public instruction
Which of the following statements about council-manager forms of government are accurate?
Correct -Nearly all small- and medium-sized California cities use a council-manager plan. -Under a council-manager form of government, voters elect a city council to engage in all legislating. Incorrect -Under a council-manager form of government, voters elect a city manager to run the administration. -Under a council-manager form of government, cities do not have mayors.
Which of the following statements about noncitizen voting in California are accurate?
Correct -San Francisco allows noncitizen parents of children enrolled in public schools the right to vote in the city's school board elections. -Noncitizens are not currently allowed to vote in statewide general elections in California. Incorrect -Noncitizens were granted the right to vote in all county elections by the California Voting Rights Act of 2001. -Noncitizens are allowed to vote in state legislative primary elections but not in general elections.
The story of Jurupa Valley illustrates which of the following facts about municipal incorporation in California?
Correct -The heavy burden of legal obligations and fiduciary responsibilities that come with incorporation can often be difficult for new municipalities to handle. -Local governments are highly dependent on state revenue and often cannot survive a diversion of revenue from Sacramento. Incorrect -Petitions for dissolution are extremely common among new cities in California. -Once a city files for dissolution, it can never become a city again, and a new incorporation plan with new city boundaries must be submitted.
Which of the following statements about strong mayor-council systems are accurate?
Correct -The mayor serves as the city's overall chief executive and has the power to appoint the heads of the city government's departments. -The mayor has veto power over city council legislation. Incorrect -The city council, not the city's voters, selects the mayor. -The city council is in charge of all budgeting decisions, including proposing and passing the city's budget.
Study the graph on population and housing growth in California since 2011, and then determine which of the following statements are accurate.
Correct -The state's population has grown at a higher rate than its construction of housing units in every year since 2011. -More housing was built in 2017 than in any other year since 2011. Incorrect -The recent housing crisis is primarily the result of a sudden and unprecedented increase in the state's population since 2014. -The largest disparity between the growth rate of the population and the growth rate of housing occurred in 2016.
Which of the following are reasons why developers have not built more housing in California in recent years?
Correct -There is a shortage of affordable land to build on -There is a shortage of construction labor Incorrect -Proposition 13 explicitly limits the number of houses that developers are allowed to build in each city every year to 1 percent of the total number of houses already existing in the city. -The federal government has issued an injunction against California that prevents additional housing construction in order to limit the state's population growth.
Study the map showing the demographics of California's counties, and then determine which following statements are accurate.
Correct -Whites compose a larger percentage of the population in Northern California counties than in Southern California counties. -Most counties in the state have populations where fewer than 45 percent of residents have a bachelor's degree or higher. Incorrect -All of the counties with a median income of over $70,000 are in the San Francisco Bay area. -Counties where whites compose the largest percentage of the population tend to have the highest levels of income.
Suppose the city you live in had too many mosquitoes but the city government refused to devote public funds to resolve the problem. If you wanted to create a special district focused on mosquito abatement, which of the following would you be required to do?
Correct -win the support of at least a majority of voters in an election -submit an application describing the special district to your county's local agency formation commission (LAFCo) Incorrect -receive approval for your application from your LAFCo, your city's mayor, and your board of supervisors -undergo a fiscal impact examination from the state Department of Finance
Nearly all of the state's airport, harbor and port, transit, water, waste, and hospital districts function as which type of district?
Enterprise districts (Enterprise districts are run like businesses and charge user fees for services. In fiscal year 2015-16, the state's enterprise districts generated a total of $21.98 billion in user fees.)
All counties in the state of California have roughly the same population.
False
The state has approximately 400 nonschool special districts.
False (Excluding the school districts, the state had 4,884 special districts in 2017.)
Every state except New York, Illinois, and California demands strict obedience to Dillon's rule.
False (Only a few states, including Alabama, Idaho, and Nebraska, demand strict obedience to Dillon's Rule and require local governments to seek their permission in order to act. Dillon's Rule is very liberally construed in California. The state's constitutional and legal framework confers broad formal powers on local governance.)
Since 1999, there have been many new cities incorporated in California, and there are now over 1,000 cities in the state.
False (Only 9 cities have incorporated since 1999, raising the total number of cities to 482 in 2018.)
A California county that is governed under the broad legal framework spelled out in the state's constitution is referred to as a(n) _______ county, while a California county whose voters have adopted their own legal framework is referred to as a(n) _______ county.
General-law, Charter
Identify which of the following roles local agency formation commissions (LAFCos) have in California.
LAFCos help resolve conflicts among local governments that compete with one another for power and resources within their county jurisdictions
Suppose there was a project to build 500 low-cost housing units in your neighborhood. If you organized protests to stop this project from going into effect because you believe it would increase traffic, drive down housing prices, and create parking shortages in your neighborhood, what might you might be accused of?
NIMBYism (NIMBY is an acronym for "Not In My Back Yard." NIMBYism is a viewpoint that leads people to oppose the building of new housing projects in their neighborhoods. In the state of California, this viewpoint is a common problem that makes building new homes, especially low-cost homes, difficult.)
A _______ is a general law that applies to all special districts of a given type while a ______ is passed by the legislature to adapt a special district's structure, financing, and authority to unique local circumstances.
Principal act, Special act
Which of the following statements about the Brown Act is accurate?
The Brown Act was designed to prevent secret meetings and backroom dealings of local government officials conducting public business
Which of the following statements about the U.S. Constitution and local governments is most accurate?
The U.S. Constitution says nothing about local governments and assigns authority only to the national and state governments (While the powers of both the national government and state governments are discussed in detail, local governments are never mentioned anywhere in the U.S. Constitution.)
Which of the following is the best description of Dillon's rule?
The constitutional doctrine that gives state governments ultimate authority over local governments (In 1868, Iowa judge John F. Dillon ruled that "municipal corporations" such as counties and cities were mere "creatures of the state" and could exercise only those powers delegated to them by the state.)
Why is it difficult to split an existing county to make a new county in California?
The state's constitution requires affirmative majority votes in both the entire county affected and the territory of the proposed county (The majority requirement among both populations was added to the constitution through an amendment in 1894. Very few counties have been split since.)
According to one study, at least 30 percent of residents in every metropolitan area within California can not afford local rent.
True
The state must build approximately 14,000 houses each year to meet the demand created by its growing population.
True
An easy way to register to vote in California is to go to the DMV and renew your driver's license.
True (In 2018, the state rolled out an automatic voter registration policy that automatically registers eligible citizens when they go to the DMV for their driver's license.)
All of the state's most populous counties are now charter counties.
True (Los Angeles, San Diego, and Orange counties, for example, are all charter counties. There is even one small county of 64,000 residents, Tehama County, that has enacted its own charter.)
The vast majority of California cities conduct at-large city council elections rather than district-based city council elections.
True (More than 90 percent of California cities conduct at-large council elections. By contrast, only 5 percent of cities use the district election method.)
Elections for all county offices are nonpartisan.
True (The Progressive Era reformers enacted nonpartisan elections as a means to insulate the important business of local government from what they saw as the distracting and corrupting influence of partisan politics.)