Yesterday was an exciting day, kicking off the campaign to save the renters' rebate. Here's some more the coverage we found today:
--> Radio coverage of the SF Rally on KPFA evening news this evening. Coverage starts about 47 minutes into the show. Assemblymember-elect Tom Ammiano vows to join with his colleagues in Sacramento and say to the Governor, "you may be a movie star and you may be an action hero, but we're going to kick your ass on this one, pal."
--> Live TV Coverage from KRON4 news in San Francisco.
--> Article in Lake County News, entitled "Coalition acts to save tax rebates for low-income seniors, blind and disabled Californians."
--> From today's San Francisco Chronicle:
Watch out, Arnold, here comes Tom: Supervisor Tom Ammiano is headed to the state Assembly, and the stand-up comic is determined to be a big, amusing thorn in Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's side.
Along with scores of renters, housing rights activists, Supervisor Aaron Peskin and other city leaders, a fired-up Ammiano stood on the steps of the state building Wednesday in San Francisco to blast the governor for eliminating $191 million in funding for low-income seniors.
At the end of every year, they receive a renters' rebate of $347, money that the governor vetoed. Ammiano said he showed up at the governor's office to complain about the elimination of the decades-old program.
"He wasn't there. I suppose he was having his legs waxed or something," he told the crowd, saying he was taken aback by the governor's smoking tent, set up outside his office to get around the state's smoking ban. He said the governor smokes cigars in there that probably cost as much as the $347 rebate.
"He lives in that tent like it's a bubble," Ammiano said, adding the governor seems to think all Californians are healthy, young and have a trust fund. "Wake up, Arnold, that ain't the truth. You may be a movie star and you may be an action hero, but we're going to kick your ass on this one!"
Ammiano says the vehicle license fee should be reinstated instead of money being taken from the poor.
--> From the San Diego Union-Tribune:
DOWNTOWN SAN DIEGO: Advocates for elderly and disabled people denounced recent state cuts to housing benefits yesterday at a news conference outside the state building.
The state budget crisis should not be shouldered by "its most vulnerable citizens," said Ann E. Menasche, an attorney for the San Diego office of Disability Rights California.
Speakers at the event, part of a statewide effort to bring attention to the issue, attacked Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger for using a line-item veto to kill tax rebates for low-income and disabled Californians.
The Senior Citizens Property Tax Program - also known as the "renters'rebate" - allows qualifying people to recoup some of their rent.
--> Story in Beyond Chron, "Momentum Grows to Save the Rent Rebate" notes the importance of the Speaker Bass statement read at the LA press conference.