LAKE COUNTY
H.R. 9263 would provide a 10-year investment tax credit to specialty crop growers
Rep. Mike Thompson (D-4th) and colleagues introduce a bipartisan tax bill for specialty crop growers to adopt new farming tools.
“California’s specialty crop producers are critical to our state and national economy, said Thompson. These tax incentives will no doubt help bolster our specialty crop industry here at home and across the nation. It’s great to join my colleagues to introduce the Supporting Innovation in Agriculture Act to prompt innovation and keep our farmers competitive on the world stag.”
The country’s food supply has long been a bipartisan concern. Unfortunately, the resilience of our domestic fresh food supply is under threat by recent supply chain disruptions, more extreme weather and drought conditions, worsening pest and disease pressures, rising food imports and inflationary pressures, and the repercussions of labor shortages.
The Supporting Innovation in Agriculture Act is backed by over 50 national and state organizations and trade associations.
The use of innovative farming technologies can be a significant way of increasing the domestic production of fruits, vegetables, tree nuts and other specialty crops while contributing to greater surety of supply, environmental conservation, and traceability throughout the supply chain. “Unfortunately, existing farm programs are not always well suited to help many specialty crop producers address the high upfront capital costs associated with innovative farming technologies and systems,” Thompson said. Many specialty crop businesses also do not have the tax liability to take advantage of existing tax incentives.
This bill helps offset a portion of the high capital costs associated with the deployment of precision agriculture technologies and controlled environment agriculture technologies. “H.R. 9263 will ensure that producers are able to adopt the innovative tools they need to compete on the global stage while also improving the resilience of our domestic fresh food supply chains,” Thompson added.
—Submitted
SACRAMENTO
California bans legacy admissions at colleges
California’s private nonprofit colleges will no longer be able to grant students an admissions advantage if their parents donated to or went to the same college after Gov. Gavin Newsom signed a law this morning banning the practice.
The state joins a rarefied group of four others that have passed laws banning legacy admissions. Colleges will still be allowed to admit students with alumni or donor ties, but they’ll no longer be able to grant preferential treatment to those applicants in the admissions process.
“In California, everyone should be able to get ahead through merit, skill, and hard work,” Newsom wrote in a press statement. “The California Dream shouldn’t be accessible to just a lucky few, which is why we’re opening the door to higher education wide enough for everyone, fairly.”
The law kicks in next year.
Partly because California enrolls the most number of college students out of any state in the country, bill backers say this legislation is a necessary corrective to last year’s U.S. Supreme Court ruling that banned all but military colleges from using race as a factor in admissions.
The court unwound almost 50 years of precedent allowing college admissions offices to use affirmative action as a way to promote campus diversity.
Like that court decision though, the legislation Newsom signed — Assembly Bill 1780 by Assemblymember Phil Ting, a Democrat from San Francisco — will affect just a few campuses in California.
Public campuses in California don’t practice legacy admissions. And state voters in 1996 changed California’s constitution to forbid public schools from using race as a factor in admissions.
If the Supreme Court decision last year sowed doubt for students that they’re wanted on college campuses, this bill aims to reverse that feeling in California and across the country, supporters say, particularly at a time when more high school graduates are skipping out on college, especially men. And while most colleges in California admit the vast majority of students who apply, backers of the bill are concerned about highly selective schools that are often conveyor belts for corporate and political influence.
In showing students that wealth doesn’t offer a leg up in the admissions process, “you’re doing something bigger related to culture and (social) fabric as students are questioning the value of college altogether and whether or not they want to pursue a higher education,” said Jessie Ryan, president of The Campaign for College Opportunity, a California-based advocacy and research organization that co-sponsored Ting’s bill.
Only seven private nonprofit universities out of about 90 in California admitted students whose family members either donated money to the school or attended the school themselves in fall 2022. Slightly more than 3,300 undergraduates — out of an admissions class of 31,633 — were legacy admissions. Last fall, it was six colleges and about 2,100 students admitted with legacy or donor ties as a factor.
—Submitted
