Photo: Andy DeanThe new state of North California, population 3.8 million, would be a band running west to east bounded by the northern edges of Sonoma, Napa, Yolo, Sutter, Yuba and Sierra counties and the southern borders of Marin, Solano, Sacramento, Amador and El Dorado counties along with Nevada and Placer counties.
Most California public pension funds have the power to raise annual employer rates when they need more money. The California State Teachers Retirement System, a century old this year, is an outlier that needs legislation to raise rates. As lawmakers at the Capitol struggled with budget cuts during a deep economic recession, pleas for a CalSTRS rate increase were not acknowledged with a legislative hearing until last year.
The Field Poll, in a survey completed last week, asked a statewide sample of California voters what they thought of these proposals. The results show that only one in four voters (25%) back the idea of having these counties break away from California to form a new state.