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California Public Utilities Commission fired director who exposed missing $200M

propublica.org

21–30 of 275 posts

Re: California Public Utilities Commission fired director who exposed missing $200M

#21
post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What you say will probably come to pass, but this sort of cynical, fatalistic attitude is part of the problem.

It is not part of the problem, it is a symptom of it.

With a positive feedback loop, trying to determine which thing came first is a waste of everyone’s time.

Re: California Public Utilities Commission fired director who exposed missing $200M

#22

Oracle, Tesla and many other companies already left the state. Good luck raising taxes even further, Cali! Texans will be very thankful to you for all the companies that now paying taxes and creating new jobs in Texas .

Honestly, the “leave California for Texas!!” comments have started to become obnoxious in their repetition. And I say that as someone who moved from California to another state very recently.

Re: California Public Utilities Commission fired director who exposed missing $200M

#23

The sad part is that CA remains a one party state and this will just get swept under the rug. The power is too unchecked.

As a European I ask myself why there’s no proportional voting system at all in the US. The states should be independent enough to introduce one for themselves, and there are also referendums.

A switch to proportional voting could require constitutional changes in most places. Also, proportional voting introduces all kinds of unnecessary problems like not having districts and thereby constituents having their votes diluted and not having a specific representative. Which is one things the American system gets right.

What we really need is a switch from "first past the post" to approval/score/range voting, which would dissolve the two party system by eliminating spoilers and thereby making third parties viable.

Score/range voting is "that thing the Olympics uses"; approval voting is "that thing the Olympics uses if the only possible scores a judge can give are 0 or 1".

As far as I can tell the biggest impediment to this is a lot of people proposing alternative systems that aren't as good (e.g. IRV) and then no change is made because proponents of change are divided on which change to make.

Re: California Public Utilities Commission fired director who exposed missing $200M

#24

The sad part is that CA remains a one party state and this will just get swept under the rug. The power is too unchecked.

As a European I ask myself why there’s no proportional voting system at all in the US. The states should be independent enough to introduce one for themselves, and there are also referendums.

The US actually had quite a few cities with proportional voting in the early-mid 1900s. NYC for example had it from 1936 to 1947 when it was eliminated via referendum[1].

[1] https://www.fairvote.org/new_york_s_proportional_representat...

Re: California Public Utilities Commission fired director who exposed missing $200M

#25
post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

She uncovers incompetence and gets fired. The article makes no allegations that she stepped on Newsom's toes, but it sure seems like it. She deserves a medal, not to be fired. The article doesn't say who hired her in the first place, just: > Stebbins was hired as the agency’s executive director in February 2018 to bring fresh scrutiny to its finances and operations. Who hired her? Also: > “I find this outrageous!” Ba…

> "I can count on zero fingers the number of times I've used an exclamation mark professionally." I feel self conscious now.

In use exclamation marks in professional communication every day. It's not unusual at all.

Re: California Public Utilities Commission fired director who exposed missing $200M

#26

The sad part is that CA remains a one party state and this will just get swept under the rug. The power is too unchecked.

As a European I ask myself why there’s no proportional voting system at all in the US. The states should be independent enough to introduce one for themselves, and there are also referendums.

Funnily enough, California's system did used to be slightly less one-sided, but an amendment introduced that was claimed would make it less one-sided actually ended up making it more.

Re: California Public Utilities Commission fired director who exposed missing $200M

#27
post #8

> In response to detailed questions, commission spokeswoman Terrie Prosper said that Stebbins’ allegation of $200 million in missing fines and fees was the result of a misunderstanding of the commission’s accounting practices. A misunderstanding of accounting practices?

Like in many accounting controversies, the fundamental problem here is how to account for future expectations. If you’re owed a big sum of money but you know for sure payment is coming soon, your accounting statements should show you as much wealthier than the actual money you have on hand, because receiving a payment you already knew you’d get shouldn’t change how you measure your financial status. The commission sa…

> you know for sure payment is coming soon

and there-in lies the catch - you cannot know for sure something that hasn't happened yet. There can not be accounting practises that count money that has yet to be received on hand.

Re: California Public Utilities Commission fired director who exposed missing $200M

#28

The sad part is that CA remains a one party state and this will just get swept under the rug. The power is too unchecked.

They might get away with it, but another metaphor is called for. Thanks to propublica they’ve pretty thoroughly failed to sweep it under the rug.

Re: California Public Utilities Commission fired director who exposed missing $200M

#29

Oracle, Tesla and many other companies already left the state. Good luck raising taxes even further, Cali! Texans will be very thankful to you for all the companies that now paying taxes and creating new jobs in Texas .

I don’t think anyone is actually worried about companies leaving California, there are plenty more

Re: California Public Utilities Commission fired director who exposed missing $200M

#30
post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Like in many accounting controversies, the fundamental problem here is how to account for future expectations. If you’re owed a big sum of money but you know for sure payment is coming soon, your accounting statements should show you as much wealthier than the actual money you have on hand, because receiving a payment you already knew you’d get shouldn’t change how you measure your financial status. The commission sa…

> you know for sure payment is coming soon and there-in lies the catch - you cannot know for sure something that hasn't happened yet. There can not be accounting practises that count money that has yet to be received on hand.

There can be and often are, because it's important to account for future expected flows - credit that's been extended and is due to be repaid, for instance, has to be accounted for. The thing is, these flows should be clearly and cleanly separated from actual cash on hand.
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