Open Government

Chapter 20. Case Study: MAPLight.org

Daniel Newman

In 2005, California legislators passed California Fresh Start, an $18 million pilot program intended to help schools pay for fresh fruit in students’ breakfasts. But there was a voice of opposition: the food processing industry, which makes money from the sale of processed fruit, not fresh fruit. Between 2001 and 2006, the food processing and sales industry contributed $2.3 million to 189 different candidates.^[165]

Acting at the behest of the food processing industry, a Central Valley lawmaker deleted the word fresh from the proposed program in 12 places, replacing it with the word nutritious.^[166]

The bill was signed into law. Schools used millions of dollars, originally intended for fresh fruit, to serve canned fruit in sugar syrup.

In 2003, Assembly Bill 83 (A.B. 83) was introduced in the California legislature. Had it passed, this bill would have imposed the same safety standards on bottled water as those applied to public water systems. A broad array of consumer and environmental groups ranging from Physicians for Social Responsibility to the state attorney general came out in favor of its passage.

After flying through the Assembly, A.B. 83 was killed in the Senate Appropriations Committee by a single vote. It never became law.

The beverage industry, which opposed A.B. 83, gave an average of $1,833 to each of the five Senate Appropriations Committee members who voted “no” on the bill—more than seven times as much money as they gave ...