Top education policy expert retires
Rick Simpson served 9 Assembly speakers in his 38-year career.
Relatively no part of California state government is more complex than the way public schools are funded, so much so that it used to be said only two people knew how the complex funding formulas worked.
One of those people was Rick Simpson.
Simpson announced his retirement early last week after 38 years as a top staffer in the Legislature. His retirement took effect at the end of August.
“Rick Simpson has played a leading role in every education issue,” said Assembly Speaker Anthony Rendon (D-Paramount) in a special recognition during Monday’s floor session.
Simpson, who became a legislative staffer in 1978, has played a leading role in the implementation of Proposition 98, the voter-approved ballot measure that establishes a minimum guaranteed funding for K-12 schools and community colleges. Proposition 98 includes formulas that dictate how many tax dollars are given to schools, based on economic conditions and previous funding.
The proposition’s author, John Mockler, died in 2015. He and Simpson, the Capitol joke has always gone, were the only two who actually knew how the law worked.
“Don’t go away, please,” joked Assemblyman Patrick O’Donnell (D-Long Beach), chair of the Assembly’s education committee.
Simpson, a former college fencer, often injected swordsmanship humor into the most tedious of legislative days and told the Capitol Morning Report that he intends to resume fencing as a hobby.
Simpson spent most of his career as staffer in the Legislature and served nine different Assembly speakers.
As Assembly members from both sides of the aisle rose Monday to praise Simpson, one small piece of political trivia came to light: Simpson, during the depths of the state’s fiscal crisis, had used his mastery of legislative rules to quietly draft a bill to impeach Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger.
The proposal, no doubt popular with liberal Democrats furious over Schwarzenegger’s insistence on deeper spending cuts, was kept in Simpson’s office desk drawer, just in case.
John A. Pérez, a former Assembly speaker, said it was Simpson who made the compelling case during those tough times to scrap the politically explosive idea.
Simpson said the rules “were not something to be exploited just for advantage or gain,” Pérez told Assembly members on Monday. “That’s what is so special about Rick.”