Facing a projected $73 billion budget deficit, state Assemblymember Gregg Hart (D-Santa Barbara) adjusted his priorities going into the March 5 primary, Hart told the Sun.
“There’s no rosy way to describe the situation; we’ve had very strong budgets for more than … 10 years, and we want to do what we can to protect the big investments we’ve made on communities moving forward,” Hart said. “I’m trying to find meaningful legislation that can make progress without being expensive. … It’s not easy to do because things that are significant often require financial support.”
The former 2nd District Santa Barbara County supervisor went to Sacramento in 2022 to represent California’s 37th District, which encompasses all of Santa Barbara County and southern SLO County. This time around, Hart faces off against Sari Domingues, a Santa Maria native and founder of the Santa Barbara County Moms for Liberty chapter, in both the March 5 primary and the November general election.
While the deficit changed Hart’s approach this campaign, he still hopes to address environmental issues and protect state homelessness and education investments in local communities, he said.
“The Constitution requires us to spend the education funding, but as the state budget is reduced, the whole baseline is reduced for all programs, and that’s what is going to be challenging,” he said. “I believe in the process we have now, and I don’t want a political agenda to be interjected into our public schools.”
Hart recently introduced the Protecting Blue Whales and Blue Skies bill that would encourage marine shipping companies to voluntarily slow down to reduce greenhouse gas emissions coming from ships and protect whales—expanding a local program he launched as a Santa Barbara County official that gave shipping companies local recognition for their work.
“The idea is to extend that program statewide and elevating that recognition to the state government will encourage more companies to participate and the benefits will dramatically increase. It’s a big impact with very little state investment,” Hart said.
Domingues joined the race because she believes that California took a downward turn, she said, and she wants to add a Republican’s perspective to the decision-making in Sacramento.
“I’m hoping I can get up to the state and help introduce bills and change the projection for where the Democratic Party is going because I’m finding out our Democratic Party up at the state [level] has an agenda and it needs to be stopped,” Domingues said. “I need to have a voice. I may not have a vote because I’m a Republican but at least I have my brain, my education, and my voice to speak reality to some of these people.”
If elected, Domingues said she hopes to change the state requirements for school curriculums, support public safety, and address California’s economic concerns.
“California has the highest tax rates, and California spends too much money. I’d really like to prioritize what this money is spent on because I don’t think they spend money correctly,” she said. “I know there’s committees up at the state level, so I’m hoping to get on these committees to see what’s getting spent and understand why they’re thinking the way they’re thinking.”
Education is her top priority, she said, because it affects communities’ health, economy, safety, and families. Domingues launched the Moms for Liberty chapter after seeing curriculum evolve and hearing from some parents about “what was pushed” in classrooms, she said.
“The state curriculum, there’s one in particular: ethnic studies. Ethnic studies, which you think that’s fine you should learn about the different ethnicities but what they’re doing is teaching negative stuff about certain ethnicities and not pushing the positive of them,” she said.
With the state’s low test scores and poor reading comprehension, she believes the state curriculum should prioritize reading, writing, and math before adding more subjects to schools, Domingues said.
“Not that I have all the answers, but I think I have the tools and the people to help figure this out and to figure it out as a group to make sure these children have knowledge,” she said.
This article appears in Feb 29 – Mar 10, 2024.