Good Ole California.

[Bande]

California being upside down financially and yet the Government spends millions on Stones for the Capitol annex project.
Along with that have the stones processed in Italy.
Not bidding out for California businesses. Crazy....

https://www.kcra.com/article/california-legislature-italy-stonework-capitol-annex-project/62249402

[HighStepper]

The operative word in that headline is "quietly."

The project involved mining 2 million pounds of granite from a quarry operated by Coldspring in Raymond, California. The granite was then shipped by boat to Italy to be fabricated by the Santucci Group. The completed stone expected to return to California later this year.

Project leaders noted the stone should match the exterior of the current historic state capitol's west side. "Unfortunately, there is not a facility in California that can perform this fabrication work. We considered a U.S.-based facility, but due to the complexity of the fabrication and time constraints, sending the granite to a U.S. facility would have significantly increased costs, which would have resulted in additional spending of taxpayer dollars."

You got to just love the part about "resulted in additional spending of taxpayer dollars." What if we didn't make the annex an exact match of the existing old Capitol stone? Gee, I wonder how much taxpayer dollars that would have saved.

[dogwalker]

I wouldn't want to live anywhere else.  How much of my money was wasted on the above?  Not much I'd guess.  Therefore I don't care.

[Romanticlover]

Democrats don't care because it's not their money, they spend our money like drunk sailors.
It's a drop in the bucket compared to what we waste on the homeless and that stupid high speed train to nowhere.

[dogwalker]

OK pay no taxes then and just let roads fall apart,
no fire or police services, and so on.
Sounds like a great life.

[Danno]

The one I hear all the time.
Get rid of the gas tax.
All road work stops, thousands lose good paying jobs.
Not easy taking care California roads compare to all the flat states.

[Romanticlover]

Another great article from KCRA about the secrecy behind the Capitol Annex Project:

https://www.kcra.com/article/california-non-disclosure-agreements-capitol-annex-project/62376142

[Danno]

It's the Capitol of our state. they should use the best material they can get.

[Hobby]

Tax payers have a right to know how taxpayers money is being spent. I hope the news media keeps pressure on California to release a report of the spending.

[CigarMan]

It's the Capitol of our state. they should use the best material they can get.

That really is NOT the issue, )I do agree we should have a high quality building) the fact that politicians think they do NOT report to their employer which is the taxpayers, is the problem.  Why the fuck are politicians signing NDAs?  They have a fiduciary duty to US and they have a duty to keep us informed and watch out how our money is spent.

[Danno]

probably the idiots that are against improving the Capital Building are the ones putting this out. they didn't want a few trees cut down.

[Romanticlover]

One of the differences between a Republican and a Democrat is the Republican wants to know how their tax money is spent. Democrats want secrecy and don't care about saving taxpayer money, it's not theirs so they don't give a shit...they will just raise taxes when they need more.

[bats]

KCRA is doing a good job of overdramatizing this "scandal." There's a whole website with lots of information about the annex project. There don't seem to have been any recent updates, but that doesn't mean there's been some blanket of secrecy.

As for the confidentiality agreement, here's how KCRA describes it in their report:

The agreement orders those who sign it to "maintain in strict confidence any documents, diagrams, information, information storage media, and data" related to the project.

This makes it sound like nobody can say anything about the project. And, hey, isn't this a public project? What's going on here?

KCRA's description is misleading because it leaves out essential details. The confidentiality agreement applies to information "made available" to anyone "performing services" in connection with the MOU that outlines how the project will be developed.

In other words, as contractors and others work with the Joint Rules Committee to complete the project, they have to keep confidential any information about the work that comes into their possession. It might be reasonable to put that in writing to prevent the people performing services from misusing information that isn't theirs.

Anyway, if there's anything that is improperly being kept from the public, someone who gives a shit should ask a court to do something about it. They can ask for injunctive relief under the Legislative Open Records Act. It's right there in the Government Code that spells out the rights of the people to know what's going on with their money. 

[dogwalker]

too long

[CigarMan]

So it is overblown to say that the legislators hid behind an NDA instead of explaining why they spent the money and how they determined this was the best way? With one party rule, hearings and process are overridden regularly.  This is not right.