Senate Floor

Secretary, please call the role.

[Roll Call]

Members. A quorum is present with the Members and our guests beyond the rail and in the gallery. Please rise.

We'll be led in prayer today by our chaplain, Sister Michelle Gorman, after which we're going to ask you to remain standing and will be led into pledge allegiance by Senator Laird. Oops.

Thank you. Gracious and merciful God. We pray this day that you will reveal Your presence through our lives in our efforts to be good stewards of our Earth.

Reveal Your creative energy in us as we commit ourselves to understanding the needs of our communities. Reveal Your fidelity in us as we respond to those who suffer from the effects of poverty, illness and lack of education. Reveal Your mercy in us when we welcome strangers and those displaced by wars, famines and floods.

Reveal Your hospitality in us. Gracious God, may we discover Your face in all those we encounter today. And may Your love be expressed through our work.

We ask this in Your name. Amen.

[Pledge of Alligence]

Members, now we're moving to privilege of the floor. I want to take this opportunity to recognize the district staff of Senator Stern from the 27th Senate District in the gallery.

Please stand. Let's give them a Senate California Senate greeting. Welcome to the Capitol.

Now, Members, we're moving on to messages from the Governor will be deemed read. Messages from the assembly will be deemed read. Reports of committees will be deemed read.

Motions, resolutions, and notice...without objection to Senate journals for December 5, 2022, through January 13, 2023, will be approved as corrected by the minute clerk. Introductions and first readings of bills will be deemed read. Consideration of the daily file, governor's appointments.

Senator Grove, are you prepared? Senator Grove, are you prepared for governance appointments? File items one and three.

Absolutely, Mr. President.

Senator Grove.

Thank you, Mr. President. Colleagues. File item one is a confirmation of Byran Beyer as the Inspector General of the State of California Department of Transportation.

Mr. Beyer has previously served as the Chief Deputy Inspector General of the California Office of Inspector General and other various positions within the California Department of Corrections. He was unanimously approved by the Rules Committee on January 11.

So I respectfully ask for your aye vote.

Any further discussion or debate on this appointment? Any further discussion, debate, hearing, and seeing none. Secretary, please call the roll.

[Roll Call]

Aye's, 35. No's, 0. The appointment is confirmed.

Now, moving on to file item three.

Thank you, Mr. President. Colleagues, file item number three is the confirmation of Yolanda Jimenez to the board of Barbering and Cosmetology. And the following three appointments to the California Arts Council are Gerald Clarke, Dr. Philip McCarty, and Roxanna Messina Captor.

These appointees were approved by the Senate Rules Committee on January 11 as a 50 vote. I respectfully ask for your aye vote.

Thank you. Any further discussion or debate on these appointments? Any further discussion or debate hearing seeing none. Secretary, please call the roll.

File item three.

[Roll Call]

Aye's, 35. No's, 0. The appointments are confirmed. Now, members, we're moving on to - we're going to return to motions and resolutions.

Now is the time for - I'm sorry, I missed that. Sorry. Now we're moving to committee announcements.

Senator Umberg?

Thank you, Mr. President. Yes. Senate Judiciary Committee -

- will meet in room 1200 upon adjournment. Thank you.

Senate Judiciary Committee will meet in room 1200 after adjournment. Now we're moving, returning back to motions and resolutions. Now it's the time for adjournment memories.

First up is Senator Pro Tem Atkins.

Thank you, Mr. President. Well, San Diego County had a difficult winter. This is the third week I've introduced an adjournment and I appreciate, colleagues, your consideration and attention.

Today I rise to adjourn in memory of Alvin Joseph Ducheny of Imperial Beach, who passed away November 6 at the age of 79. Al was the husband of former state Senator Denise Moreno Ducheny, who represented the 40th District until 2010. So, Al was a member of our Senate family.

Born in New York City in March 19, 1943. Al grew up in Florida in DeLand and later Clearwater. Senator Channey described Al as a guitar-playing singer, artist, adventurer, fisherman, and activist.

It's a pretty good description. Al, a colorful and passionate man, was all of those things and more. Al served in the US Navy in the early sixty s and later lived in New Jersey, the state of Washington, and San Francisco, all before settling in San Diego in the mid-1970s.

In San Diego, he worked at the Westgate Tuna Cannery, and he became a shop steward for his union. He moved on to become a census taker in his community of Sherman Heights. During the 1980 census, Al met Denise, and the couple married in 1980; he worked as the manager of her law firm and also became a community organizer.

He organized neighbors in Logan Heights and Barrio Logan into the Harbor View Community Council to fight for community access to the San Diego Bay and other efforts to improve the community. In 1985, he was honored by the Byrne Institute for his role in running into a burning building across the street from their law office to evacuate neighbors. When Denise decided to run for the San Diego Community College District Board in 1990, he became her campaign manager.

Later, he took on and ran her successful campaigns for the State Assembly in 94, 96, and 98 and then for the State Senate in 2002 and 2006. Throughout her career, Denise and Al were full partners. He not only managed her law firm and her political campaigns, but he was always helping the district staff with community events.

Senator Ducheni was out of office for two years in between the Assembly and Senate, and I managed to be fortunate to have two of her staff members come work for me. Jeff Gattas, who's now the Chief of Staff to the UCSD Chancellor, and Kim Craig, who now is part of her own business up here as a consultant. So, as a new council member, I said, So I've got a dilemma.

Al's on the phone and Denise is on the other line. Which call do you take first? Without hesitation, and immediately, the answer was Al. Denise and Al again were partners.

They worked together during and after her legislative tenure to develop strong binational relationships with Mexico, particularly with neighbors in Baja California and Baja California Sur. Al loved traveling, camping, fishing throughout the Baja Peninsula, starting in the later organizing meetings with legislators and government officials on both sides of the border. Al served the State of California on the State Athletic Commission and the Commission of the Californias.

He served on the nonprofit board for the Anza Borrego Foundation, where he spearheaded starting a fifth-grade camp outdoor educational program, which continues to grow to this very day. He has survived by his wife of 42 years, as I've stated, Senator Denise Moreno Duceni, by countless people whose lives he touched. If I have one regret, it's that we both learned that we had an affinity for old country music and Al could play the guitar, and I told him I sort of could play the banjo.

And we talked about getting together in Imperial Beach, his home, and jamming, as he said. I can't jam, but at any rate, it is my biggest regret that I didn't have that opportunity to enjoy time with him and Denise down in Imperial Beach doing what they love best, just bringing people together for a good time and good food. So, colleagues, please join me in recognition and to give sympathies to Denise, our former colleague, and the loss of Alvin Joseph Ducheny.

Thank you. On behalf of the California State Senate, we extend our most sincere condolences to the Ducheny family, and we ask that the name be brought forward so he can be properly memorialized. Next up is Senator Weiner.

Thank you, Mr. President. Colleagues, it's with great sadness that I rise to ask that the Senate adjourn in memory of Crispin Hollings, who passed away in November at the age of 61. Crispin was born in 1961 and earned degrees in mechanical engineering and French from the University of Virginia.

He began his career working for Pratt Whitney in Hartford, Connecticut, and then hopped across the Atlantic to take a job at Airbus in Toulouse, France, and ultimately moved out west to San Francisco in the 1990s to take a job at United Airlines in its engine shop at San Francisco International Airport. After being promoted to a supervisory role, he decided he needed to learn even more about the industry. And so he enrolled at San Francisco City College and took a two-year program in airplane maintenance.

He later earned his MBA from UC Berkeley and served as an employee of the city of San Francisco, first with the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission and the Water Department and then ultimately as the chief financial officer in the San Francisco Sheriff's Department. He really worked his way up. He was that talented.

Crispin embraced every part of our LGBTQ community and did so throughout his entire life. He started with activism in Hartford, Connecticut, and continued that activism in San Francisco up until his death. He fought valiantly for our community, and he never took no for an answer when it came to advancing the LGBTQ community.

He was an unabashedly staunch advocate, and he elevated others with the energy and enthusiasm of his work and his insight. Crispin felt a responsibility to establish a public presence, to be in the streets, never to hide, never to be secretive, and for people to know exactly who he was in his fight. Christian was my neighbor.

I've known him for many years. He lived about two blocks from where I do in the Castro. He served as a treasurer for the Castro Upper Market Community Benefit District.

He was involved deeply with the Castro Country Club, which is a sober recovery community center in the Castro. And he was a very, very prominent leader in the recovery community in San Francisco, and he served on the board of directors of the Alice B. Toklas LGBTQ Democratic Club.

Crispin's death, it's hard to overstate the loss for the Castro community. This is one of those people, and we all have them in communities throughout our districts, that small group of people who make things happen and who don't need to be asked or told what to do. They just sort of know that they get up, and they do the work, and they do it without accolades.

And Crispin was one of those people. He died very, very suddenly and unexpectedly, and just terrible tragedy for our community. He leaves behind his loving husband, Luis, as well as his mother, Jennifer, his sisters Charlotte and Jean, his brother Paul, four nieces and four nephews and a niece, and his godsister Jocelyn in the United Kingdom.

And he is preceded in death by his former partner, Eric Rofes, who passed away in 2006. Crispin, we love you. We miss you.

Rest in peace.

Thank you. On behalf of the California State Senate, we extend our condolences. Please bring the name forward so he could be properly memorialized.

Next up is Senator Rubio.

Thank you, Mr. President, ladies and gentlemen of the Senate. Today, I stand with a heavy heart to ask that we close on behalf of El Monte Police Chief Ben Lowry, who I got to know really well. I want to start by sending my condolences to his family, the El Monte police, the El Monte community, who lost not only a great chief, but an even better human being. Chief Lowry began his law enforcement career back in 2000 with the LA -

- County Sheriff's Department. Later, he joined the El Monte police in 2002. He was appointed acting chief in December 2021 and became the permanent chief this past June of 2022, just five months before his passing.

During this time, El Monte went through a very difficult time. Two of their police officers were fatally shot. And it was his job to comfort the community, the families, staff -

- and this entire time, you would not know that he was dealing with his own illness. He wanted to take care of others. So he never said anything to me, and to some of us, it was sudden, but he knew.

He just wanted to make sure that his community, his police officers and everyone else was okay. Before taking care of himself, he held a variety of critical roles. He did it all too long of a list to list.

His commitment to the department, along with his sense of humor and leadership style, allowed him to develop great relationships with his staff, city employees, both inside and outside the police department. I only recently learned that during staff meetings, he would often tell his officers to "Leave your eagles and ranks at the door. It does not matter here.

We are here to solve problems." He was a man of true values and always tried his best to do the right thing because it was the right thing to do. Jake Fisher, the current El Monte chief of police and friend of Chief Lowry, described him as someone not afraid of a fight when warranted.

His childhood best friend describes him as a protector. When the chief spoke at the funeral of two fallen El Monte police officers, Chief Lowry said, "They left this world as valiant heroes, not because of how they died, but because of how they lived." The exact statement holds true for Chief Lowry as he dedicated his life to protecting others, taking care of his community, his police officers, and everyone around him.

And doing so he did that with the utmost integrity, honor, and bravery. I was fortunate to get to know him, had many, many conversations with him, and I just generally thought he was such a good human being. It wasn't until later I met his father and I had a brief conversation with him that I understood why why he was who he was.

His big heart, his kind demeanor, just that caring spirit. And I was his father, who really showed me where he came from. It was the day of his funeral, and his father comes up to me and asks me how I was doing, if I was okay, and thanked me for my service here at the State Capitol.

This is a man who was hurting, and yet he took time to look out for everyone else as well. So now we know why Chief Lori was the great human being that he was. My thoughts and prayers are with his family.

He is survived by his wife, Amber, and their four children, Jacob, Ella, Ivy, and Porter. Chief Ben Lowry, thank you so much for your service, your dedication, and for protecting our community. Your memory will always live on inside of all of us.

Thank you.

Thank you. And on behalf of the California State Senate, we want to extend our condolences to you, to the Chief's family and bring his name forward so he can be properly memorialized if there's no other business. Senator Atkins, the desk is clear.

Mr. President. Thanks so much. Our next floor session will be this Thursday, January 19, 2023, at 09:00 A.M.