California state senators put the state's top DMV official in the hot seat Tuesday, demanding answers about why dangerous drivers keep their licenses even as road deaths climb — and getting very few straight answers in return.

Sen. Jesse Arreguín (D-Oakland), who chairs the Senate Public Safety Committee, pointed to a specific case covered by CalMatters — that of Kostas Linardos, who drove a three-ton pickup truck at high speed into a sedan in late 2022 after years of speeding and reckless driving tickets. A toddler died in the crash.

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Gordon’s grilling came at a state Senate informational hearing jointly held by the public safety and transportation committees. It appears to be the first such legislative hearing focused on DUIs, traffic laws and roadway fatalities in decades. 

Sen. Jesse Arreguín, an Oakland Democrat who chairs the Senate Public Safety Committee, focused on the case of Kostas Linardos, who drove a three-ton pickup truck at high speed into the back of a sedan in late 2022 after years of wracking up tickets for speeding and reckless driving.

“The case that was in CalMatters yesterday, you know, a toddler lost their life because we didn’t flag this earlier in the process and this person was allowed to drive,” Arreguín said. “We’re talking about people’s lives. That’s what we’re trying to protect here.”

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Last week, State Senator Jesse Arreguín introduced SB 1218, a bill that would require the Department of Motor Vehicles to refuse to renew vehicle registrations for individuals who have outstanding fines for illegal dumping. The DMV already does this with individuals who have unpaid parking tickets and other fines.

“For too long, illegal dumpers have treated fines as optional while our neighborhoods pay the price,” Arreguín said in a press statement. “If you trash our communities, there will be consequences.”

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State Sen. Jesse Arreguin and Assemblymember Mia Bonta introduced a new bill aimed at holding illegal dumpers accountable.

The bill would require the Department of Motor Vehicles to refuse to renew vehicle registrations for owners with unpaid illegal dumping fines.

"By improving the collection of fines, we can help deter future violations while helping cities recover the cost associated with clean up and code enforcement," said Arreguin.

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Senate Bill 948, introduced by state Sen. Jesse Arreguin, D-Oakland, would require more paperwork for gun importers.

A personal firearm importer trying to import a gun into the state would have to get a firearm safety certificate, which would have to be accompanied by a report on the gun owner and the firearm itself. The report is already required by law

Under the new legislation, anyone trying to bring a gun into the state would have to acquire the certificate within 60 days of coming into California.

The bill would also require an applicant for a firearm safety certificate to take an eight-hour training course that covers firearm safety and handling. The course includes live-fire shooting exercises at a range. This would apply to anyone bringing a gun into California after July 1, 2028.

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Governor Newsom signed legislation extending a $590 million bridge loan to BART, Muni, AC Transit, and Caltrain on Thursday to avert doomsday-scenario service cuts that would have begun this summer. This will help keep Bay Area transit on track, leading towards a November election where long-term transit funding is expected to go before voters.

"This emergency loan is a critical band-aid. It holds off disastrous transit cuts until long-term, significant funding can come through from the Connect Bay Area measure," said Senator Scott Wiener (D-San Francisco), who championed the loan along with Senator Jesse Arreguin (D-Berkeley), in a joint statement. "We spent much of the past year negotiating this loan with regional stakeholders and the Governor, and I’m immensely proud that we got it over the finish line."

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“This loan will avert a traffic catastrophe and save millions of Bay Area transit riders from losing their ride to work, family and school,” said Wiener, who helped negotiate for the loan alongside his colleague, state Sen. Jesse Arreguín, D-Berkeley. “After months at the bargaining table, ‘I’m immensely proud that we got it over the finish line,” Wiener said. Arreguín called Thursday’s development “a major victory.”

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“During my time as mayor, we saw the biggest housing boom in 50 years,” he said.

During his first year in the Senate, he authored three housing bills, mostly aimed at helping local governments comply with state housing law. He also signed on as one of the co-authors of Assembly Bill 609, the bill exempting infill housing from the California Environmental Quality Act that was eventually included in the budget. Arreguín called the bill a “game-changer.”

Arreguín also brings to the job his lived experience as a renter — one of only three renters in the Senate — and says he strongly supports rent control and eviction protections.

“We can't address housing affordability by just focusing on rental protections. We need to do that, and we also need to build housing.”

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As the mayor of Berkeley, state Sen. Jesse Arreguín pushed to build more homes in the well-off and famously liberal community in the San Francisco Bay Area. Yet, he is still a renter in that area and was evicted several times while growing up in San Francisco, he said. 

That experience gives him a perspective that he said he will use to help shape California’s housing and homelessness future as chair of the Senate Housing Committee.

“I know what it’s like to lose your home and how scary and challenging it is to not have a place to live, and there are thousands of people in our state who experience that on a weekly, if not monthly, basis,” the Berkeley Democrat told The Sacramento Bee in a recent interview. “So, that’s why I’m really focused on not just building homes but also protecting our neighbors from homelessness.”

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Former Berkeley Mayor and 7th State Senate District Sen. Jesse Arreguín was appointed Chair of the Senate Housing Committee earlier this month. Arreguín, who remains the Chair of the Senate Public Safety Committee, will begin leading the committee Feb. 1.

Since voters elected Arreguín to the state Senate in November 2024, he has introduced three bills to facilitate housing development, all of which were signed into law.The bills remove barriers to accessory dwelling unit construction, require public agencies to publish housing development application criteria and clarify existing law on local government housing plans.

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AMBITIOUS AGENDA: A legislative panel with power to shape California housing policy will see a major change next month after a year of bruising battles over incentivizing home construction.

State Sen. Jesse Arreguín, a Berkeley Democrat and renter, will take over his chamber’s Housing Committee, succeeding Aisha Wahab, who clashed with pro-development YIMBYs like state Sen. Scott Wiener.

“I come to the position with a deep amount of experience on housing issues. Also, I come as a renter and somebody who’s faced housing insecurity and displacement that’s really driven my very strong advocacy for affordable housing and housing production. And I come to this work with a body of experience as a mayor and as a regional official, helping advance housing production and housing throughout the San Francisco Bay Area.”

“I do intend to take the committee in a slightly different direction, because I believe that we need an all-of-the-above approach to how we address the state’s housing crisis. It isn’t just about affordable housing and protecting renters. It’s also about building housing. We have an acute housing shortage in California, and not just in ownership, but also in rental housing. And that’s what’s driving displacement and homelessness that impacts cities throughout our state.”

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