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Thursday, Mar 28, 2024

Anti-Tax Campaigner

Joel Fox is the epitome of a political insider. A longtime policy consultant for businesses and politicians including Arnold Schwarzenegger and Richard Riordan, he also runs the popular California political blog Fox & Hounds Daily. The site, boasting 10,000 email newsletter subscribers, features daily contributions from politicians, analysts, business leaders and Fox himself about policy issues affecting the business community in California. Fox got his start in politics as an aid with the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association shortly after the group ran a successful campaign to pass the property tax initiative Proposition 13 in 1978. He took over as president of the association in 1986 and played a key role in ballot proposition campaigns including Proposition 218 in 1996, which gave voters the right to decide on tax increases passed by the State Legislature. He was the founder and president of the Small Business Action Committee from 2003 to 2017, where he fought for business interests such as workers’ compensation reform. He currently runs his own political consulting firm, Joel Fox Consulting, out of his home in Granada Hills. The Business Journal caught up with Fox to talk about the upcoming election, how the businesses community can impact politics in Sacramento and his part-time career as a mystery novelist. Question: How did you get your start in politics? Answer: I have a 40-year rap sheet in California politics. I started out defending Proposition 13, which was passed in June 1978. I was hired by the Howard Jarvis (Taxpayers) Association to be Howard Jarvis’ aid in 1979, a year after it passed. At the time, Howard was a hot property. He had just published a book called “I’m Mad as Hell,” and he was going on a book tour. My first job was to travel the country with him and make sure we got where we were supposed to go. When Howard passed away in 1986, I became the president of the association. The new chairman of the board was Arthur Laffer. He stayed on for about a year and decided he didn’t want to do it anymore, but I established myself during the course of that year. I stayed on as president for a dozen years until the end of 1998. We did a few ballot measures, including Proposition 218 in 1996, which was the “Right to Vote on Taxes Act.” When did you begin working on political campaigns? Dick Riordan, the former mayor of Los Angeles, brought me on as director of policy for his campaign for governor in 2001 to do some speech writing. Great guy, not the best candidate. He didn’t always follow what people wanted him to do. He had a big lead on the the Democrat, Gray Davis, who was the incumbent. But (Davis’) campaign manager did what was ultimately a brilliant thing during the primary. He ran ads against Riordan, so that he would lose the Republican nomination and the weaker candidate Bill Simon became the nominee. Title: Editor-in-chief Company: Fox & Hounds Daily Born: Boston, 1949 Education: Bachelor’s degree, University of Amherst; master’s degree, University of Denver. Personal: Lives in Granada Hills with his wife and Midnight, an American Labrador. Hobbies: Walking, writing mystery novels, Boston Red Sox. Who else did you work with? A year later, when things went to hell, Arnold Schwarzenegger came along with the recall election, and I worked with Arnold. I was in the headquarters every day as a tax advisor. Then what? I had started the Small Business Action Committee right around the time I went off to work with Arnold. It was just at that moment we were getting started with one of the biggest issues he faced at the beginning of his term, which was workers’ compensation. It was driving businesses out of California. Other states were advertising in business journals here saying, “Come to Idaho” or “Come to Michigan because we don’t charge these terrible rates for workers’ compensation.” It was our job to try to fix it. How did you convince the legislature to take up the issue? I was — as the Los Angeles Times once called me — an initiative warrior, because I’d been through all these fights. To pressure the legislature to act, we decided to move on an initiative. Arnold had nothing directly to do with it, but he was certainly aware of it, and he certainly said to the legislators, “If you don’t like Fox’s initiative — which was pretty severe — compromise with me or else that’s what you’re going to get.” We waited right up until the last day we had to file the papers. I was in the gallery at the Assembly that day and I can’t tell you how many legislators stood up and said, “If it weren’t for that darn initiative, I’d be voting no. But I’m going to vote yes.” And that’s how workers’ comp was passed in California. Why did you create Fox and Hounds? I started Fox and Hounds during this period to promote business and get the idea out. I was a fairly successful op-ed writer; I had 60 pieces in the L.A. Times. But I knew how hard it was to get an op-ed piece in newspapers and that people had things to say about government. I thought Fox and Hounds was another platform for them in this new digital age where they could actually write an op-ed piece. We publish four of them a day and try to get their story out. I know for a fact that proponents of whatever issue will take a piece and circulate it in the legislature. And over the years, I’ve tried to get even some politicians involved. Arnold wrote a few pieces for me. The Democrats have been a little harder because we’re viewed as center – right, even though I’ve had people on all sides. Dave Low (Chief Executive of the California School Employees Association) has written five or six times for me. Antonio Villaraigosa wrote a couple of pieces when he was mayor and John Perez when he was speaker. What do you get from running the site? We have some advertising, but it’s hardly anything. We’ve survived because I do the content — it keeps me personally relevant. Because otherwise, I’m drifting away. And that’s OK. I’m getting up to that drifting away age. It keeps me relevant and keeps me active. You also teach a course at Pepperdine University. What’s it about? It’s called the relationship between state and local government. We’ll talk about California political issues, state government issues, local government and where they crossover. And I bring in a lot of speakers. It’s a popular class because they get a chance to see the real world. I had Gavin Newsom; I had John Perez when he was speaker. He came to speak to my class one day and he said, “Excuse me, I have to walk out.” He went out and took a phone call and when he came back, he had been told he was going to be the next speaker of the Assembly. He came back twice – I think it was good luck for him. If Gavin Newsom is elected governor, what do you expect his policy positions to look like? Gavin Newsom has laid out a much more liberal platform than Jerry Brown has. But I think a lot of that is for election consumption and he will move toward the middle a little bit more. He’s going to try to keep everyone happy by saying, “Look, a lot of these big changes need time.” We’ll have committees and we’ll talk about changes, but I don’t see that he’s going to endorse a lot of the dramatic changes that he’s endorsing now, whether that’s single payer, being the prime example. I saw him at Philippe’s (restaurant) about a month ago. He was there with John Chiang getting John’s endorsement. He’s been to my class before and he asked if he could come back. I said sure. As if he has time. (Laughs) How can business leaders reach politicians in Sacramento or City Hall? Labor definitely has power over the politicians in Sacramento and in (Los Angeles) City Hall. It really comes down to arguing that everyone rises under a good economy and that you can’t hurt business and expect to take care of the people you want to take care of. That’s the message you’re trying to get through. What can Republicans and pro-business politicians do to increase their influence in California? They’re going to have to understand the California demographics. I think they have a great opportunity. The argument that you hear is that because of the rise of the Latino population, Democrats are having success at the polls. But Latinos are a very entrepreneurial people. And the idea of reaching out to them and giving them the message of opportunity is really important. It’s not just being Republican; it’s about telling people you’re going to help them. It’s the old story of we want to improve things by teaching you how to fish, not by handing you the fish. That’s the difference in philosophy that they have to sell. November seems to be all about Trump. And that’s going to distract from that argument. The fact of the matter is that it’s hard to argue policy issues when the politics have become so polarized. What can the business community do to get these arguments across? I’ve often argued that one of the faults with the business community is that if there’s a threat to an individual business, they will stand up and fight like hell, but they won’t have a program that says business is important to the state of California. It’s important that we all rise together, and business will be the backbone of that rise. You will hear ads, particularly on the radio in off-election years, from the California Teachers Association saying how important the public schools are. And so when they do get into a fight over a tax issue or a pension issue, they have laid a foundation. Business, I have argued for years, should do the exact same thing – lay a foundation, talk about how capitalism has led to this rise of everyone’s lifestyle and how it could even be better if there were fewer regulations. The business community doesn’t think that way. They just sit back and they wait, and then when the threat is at their door, they’ll come out swinging for that particular business or that particular industry. What are the most consequential November ballot initiatives for businesses? The gas tax and the rent control propositions will be the most high profile. I think business is all in on defeating rent control. With the gas tax, the business community, especially the major business associations, are going to support the government’s position to defeat the repeal because they think they need the money for transportation purposes. One of the things that will decide the proposition is the price of gas on election day. What about the bond measures on the ballot? The problem with bond measures is that most people just don’t get it. They’ll see a measure on the ballot and see it’s an $8.9 billion bond, but by the time you pay interest, it’s double that. And people think it’s free money because it’s not a tax. I just don’t think they have the facts. Are ballot initiatives more helpful or hurtful for the state? I think they’re good. They’ve become a real political weapon in California. They’ve actually moved the legislature, like we did with workers’ comp. Now they’re doing it even more with other measures. I think it’s important to have the process as a fallback when the legislature doesn’t act. And we’ve definitely become a one-party state, which is not healthy in my mind. An initiative might be able to speak to people and address issues where the voters actually want to go rather than where the majority in the legislature wants to go. What are your mystery novels about? In “Lincoln’s Hand,” the hero is an FBI agent and he has to solve a historical mystery to solve a modern-day murder. Here’s what it says on the back cover: “Unable to close his previous case against the monument bomber, senior FBI agent Zane Rigby has been reassigned to uncover secrets. Is Abraham Lincoln’s body in his grave?” This one I did a lot of research for. Where Lincoln’s body is now and where he is in the book is a little bit different, but everything else was part of the historical record. He was moved around 17 times and there was an attempt to steal this body. So it’s all based on that — Is Lincoln in his grave? What was the best advice you ever received? Howard (Jarvis) taught me one lesson: You need to have iron pants in this business. I’ve learned that very well. There have been a lot of rough times.

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