When he entered the race for California governor, San José Mayor Matt Mahan pitched himself as a pragmatic Democrat who would prioritize improving residents’ quality of life and government efficiency.
He unveiled a key part of that promise on Tuesday with an expansive plan to reform state government, including tying pay raises for elected officials and other top leaders to improvements on key issues, and pledging not to approve any tax increase until the state proves “that we can deliver better outcomes with the dollars we already have.”
Mahan also delivered a blistering rebuke of ballooning state spending — which, as he often points out on the campaign trail, has increased nearly 75% over the last six years. In 2020, amid the COVID-19 pandemic and accompanying economic uncertainty, California lawmakers approved a no-frills state budget that came in at $202 billion. Gov. Gavin Newsom’s latest spending proposal is nearly $349 billion.
“We have fallen into this lazy, reflexive mindset of always going back to voters and telling them that the only solution to every problem is a tax increase or a new bond or a new rule coming down from Sacramento,” Mahan said in an interview. “We need to step back and take a really hard look at our existing spending and increase the level of transparency and accountability in government.”
His eight-page plan includes ways to measure and track accountability, some of which are drawn from policies in other states. They include lobbying reforms, following up on audit recommendations and overhauling the state’s digital infrastructure and its procurement process — services Mahan described as “clunky and cumbersome.”
He also proposed a “California Performance Review,” inspired by a similar effort in Texas throughout the 1990s, that would review state agencies and solicit input from employees to eliminate waste and inefficiencies.
But near the top of the list is a proposal to tie pay raises for state officials including the governor, lawmakers and thousands of gubernatorial appointees to “measurable outcomes” in areas such as reducing homelessness and unemployment.
“People in the real world don’t get raises if they don’t do a good job,” Mahan said, “and I think it should be the same for the politicians and senior administrators who are allocating budgets, leading projects, making the big decisions on behalf of the people of California.”
Though the benchmarks would be created with input from the state Legislature, Mahan floated one example: reducing unsheltered homelessness by 5% to 10% within one year, something he said he’s accomplished three years in a row in San José.
It’s a solution one might expect from a former entrepreneur and mayor of a city in the heart of Silicon Valley. Mahan made a similar proposal at the local level last year, but it was rejected by the City Council.
“Tying pay to performance is nothing short of revolutionary in government. It’s a private-sector model that is overdue,” said former state Sen. Steve Glazer (D-Orinda), a Mahan supporter who sponsored several bills aiming to increase transparency in government.
Dozens of tech company executives are backing Mahan in the race for governor and have collectively donated millions to his campaign, as well as two independent expenditure committees supporting him.
That has raised concerns from some voters, and criticism from some of Mahan’s opponents, that he would be beholden to their interests and veto future regulations on tech or artificial intelligence companies.
Mahan has sought to dispel those concerns, arguing that he believes AI and social media platforms should be regulated. Of his plan to overhaul state information technology systems and infrastructure, he said that “whenever we spend public dollars, we have to run open, transparent and competitive procurement processes that ensure best value for the taxpayers.”
Though Mahan did not specify how he would link government outcomes to pay raises, state lawmakers have largely panned his campaign and are unlikely to get on board. The change probably would also require voter approval.
Currently, annual raises for elected officials are determined by a citizen commission that was added to the California Constitution in 1990. Changing how that panel works or imposing limits on when it can approve raises would require a constitutional amendment, which requires voter sign-off.
But Mahan contended it would be one of the fastest ways to fix a system that he says works for special interests at the expense of working people.
“I’m under no illusion that this will be easy, but I think it’s a necessary realignment of incentives,” he said. “We have to make ourselves as accountable to the people as we possibly can be.”
