“The State Senate agrees on most things,” says Sen. Angelique Ashby. Speaking on the perceptions some small-business owners may have of a legislative body under one-party control by big margins, the Sacramento lawmaker adds, “I think that it’s not intentionally hostile to small businesses, but I think it does feel that way. Look, I felt that. When I was a small-business owner, there were fees and fines and nowhere to even go to know that they exist, until you’ve missed the deadline.”

Ashby provided NFIB California State Director John Kabateck a refreshing insight into the workings of the upper chamber of the Legislature, where working with – not ignoring because of their numerical minority — her Republican colleagues, such as Senators Brian Jones and Brian Dahle, on the issues of importance, is the norm.

As for the numerical superiority Democrats hold in both chambers, Ashby said, “The Democratic Party tent is massive, and to go from one end of the extreme of the Democratic Party to the other end of the Democratic Party is a long walk. So, it’s not a monolith just because we have a D next to our name. So, the pathway forward [in looking for solutions to the issues facing Californians] is about commonality. We’re all here because we want the betterment of our state.”

On some of those issues, Ashby had this to say:

Water–”Flood control is the other side of the coin from drought, and drought is a constant potential reality for the state of California.” On this issue, Ashby said there is unwritten, unspoken, bipartisan consensus in preparing the state for the next drought.

Housing/Homelessness–”If you think solving the housing issue alone is going to solve homelessness, you’re delusional, because until we get at the root of mental health problems and drug addiction in the state of California, we will continue to have a lot of these problems … It’s also not kindness just to house them or take them out of view. It takes a lot of services and a lot of resources to really make a dent in the problem.”

Crime–”We’re not going to police out of it,” said Ashby, who called for giving district attorneys more tools. “Every offense can’t be a first offense. Nobody on either side is going to want to penalize people, but I think in our attempt to reduce prison populations … we’ve allowed a gap that creates an opportunity for repeat offenders to not be held accountable. We need to close that gap, and how we do that is controversial.”

Click the arrow below to listen to the entire discussion with Senator Ashby and click here to see all prior NFIB California podcasts.