Welcome to ‘Rusty Areias Week’ in the CA Legislature: Highway Naming Passes

Welcome to ‘Rusty Areias Week’ in the California Legislature.

Late in the day last Wednesday, August 5, both the Senate and Assembly leadership coincidentally announced two separate hearings for this week to continue groveling to former fat-cat lobbyist/lightweight former Assemblyman Rusty Areias.

June 29th, there was a dust-up in the Assembly Transportation Committee over Sen. Cortese’s bill to name Highway 152 after Areias. Committee Chairwoman Assemblywoman Lori Wilson (D-Suisun City) pulled SCR 129 from the agenda after  heated exchange with Sen. Cortese.

Suddenly, last week, the bill was rescheduled for hearing. Did it take some arm-twisting, horse-trading, deal-making and not-so-subtle threats? Was Committee Chairwoman Assemblywoman Lori Wilson promised something? Or what about the members whose votes they needed?

First up, the Assembly Transportation Committee rescheduled a hearing for Monday afternoon, August 10, to hear Senate Constitutional Resolution 129 by Senator Dave Cortese (D-San Jose), which names a stretch of road in Santa Clara County as “Rusty Areias Highway.”

The hearing was scheduled for 2:30pm, but did not start until about 4:40pm. A few people hung around outside of the hearing room, waiting and waiting.

The Globe was among those waiting for the hearing. And clearly the others waiting had no idea, as I overheard most of what they said outside of the hearing room.

Two lobbyists were nearby talking about how “some b**** wrote a couple of articles claiming Rusty did this and Rusty did that…” I learned that one of the lobbyists was sent by Willie Brown to testify on behalf of  Rusty Areias.

Since when is a highway naming such a big deal that former Assembly Speaker, and former San Francisco Mayor Willie Brown sends his former aid, William G. “Billy” Rutland Jr., with KP Public Affairs, a longtime Sacramento lobbyist, to testify?

There must be a really big backstory to this whole thing. No one goes to this much trouble for a highway naming – especially for someone still living.

The chatting lobbyists said that “Rusty deserves it.”

Also waiting in the hallway was powerful lobbyist Terry McHale with Aaron Read and Associates, who according to sources, has been hammering Democrats legislators for both “Areias Highway” and to get “good old Rusty” confirmed to the UC Board of Regents. McHale was the press flak for Areias back in the 1990s when Areias and Gary Condit were part of “The Gang of Five” in the California Legislature, as well as running buddies.

Read more here about Rusty Areias’s connections and conflicts.

Remember, the issue is over recognizing a former legislator, who is still alive, and concerns about using state resources to grant a special favor for a registered lobbyist. It’s a big conflict of interest for a lobbyist whose firm has over 100 clients with business before the California Legislature.

Rusty Areias is very much alive. And he is a registered lobbyist with California Strategies public affairs. Naturally many are questioning why a highway is being named after a living former legislator and lobbyist.

So what’s really going on here? And why does Rusty Areias need a highway named after him? And why were three of the most powerful Sacramento lobbying forms pushing for naming the Rusty Areias Highway?

A little later, still waiting in the hallway, the two lobbyists called me some right wing nut who would trash anybody against Trump.

They sounded like gossipy middle school girls, trashing a popular girl.

I wondered why they never questioned who I was, or why I was sitting there waiting, as we were the only people who waited the two hours in the hallway.

Once the hearing started, Assemblyman Patrick Ahrens (D-Cupertino) introduced Senate Constitutional Resolution 129 on behalf of Senator Dave Cortese (D-San Jose), to name a stretch of road in Santa Clara County as “Rusty Areias Highway.”

Lobbyist Billy Rutland sat next to him in front of the committee, and gave pretty lame testimony, saying he’d done a lot of work with Rusty Areias, and spent an inordinate amount of time with Rusty, therefore the highway naming was a good idea.

No support or opposition witnesses appeared.

The committee did not yet have a quorum, so the vote waited until they did, when it passed with 10 votes. Republican Assembly members Laura Davies and Tom Lackey voted YES on the Rusty Areias Highway.

The transportation committee violated its own rules by passing the Rusty Areias Highway as specifically and notably, the Assembly Transportation Committee has a policy establishing criteria for highway naming resolutions.  One of these criteria states: “The person being honored must be deceased.”

The hearing is still not posted to the Assembly video archives, but the Globe will add it in when it does.

UPDATE 10:00am: The hearing is posted, here is the link.

Next up this week, and not to be outdone, the Senate has Rusty Areias’ appointment to the UC Regents up for a rubber stamp by the Senate Rules Committee on Wednesday, August 12, at 1:30pm.