School’s Out

Almost every one of California’s 120 legislators left town last month, and last week Gov. Brown finished his solemn task of cleaning up the mess they left.

I wish I could say it was this year’s rambunctious Legislature that kept me from posting on Sac Rag for the last five months. It definitely is on the list of reasons, right below ‘lazy,’ ‘distracted,’ and ‘goofy kid wearing the ‘College’ t-shirt from Animal House who ran a stop sign, totaled my car, and condemned me to a Kafkaesque eternity of dealing with insurance companies and car dealerships’ (no one was hurt, thank God, except my faith in traffic laws). It made me hope, while sifting through the 1000s of bills our Legislature served up this year, that at least one stiffened the penalties for stop sign-running – but no luck. Apparently there were 1000s of other issues worth legislating.

Now that the hum of Sacramento’s Capitol campus has died down for the time being, I’ve had a breather to wonder how the state’s annual cycle of legislative madness affects not only my blogging libido but also the offbeat Northern California town in which our migratory Legislature roosts.

Off the top of my head, Sacramento’s downtown scene will be a quieter, more relaxed setting. The local fundraiser circuit – Chops, Ella, the Park, Mix Downtown – will see less business. And no more massive visits from associations on their “legislative day” – when trade groups and other organizations fly hundreds of members to Sacramento to lobby their legislators, dropping bank at local hotels, convention halls, restaurants, bars, and taxi services.

I wonder if Sac Rag’s readership has any observations of how the ends and beginnings of the legislative session affect the Sacramento community (besides robbing its most intrepid bloggers of their time and inspiration, of course).