State Assemblyman Phil Ting shares his plans for next term

(SAN FRANCISCO) - Assemblyman Phil Ting who has been elected since 2012 will run for re-election on November 3. He wants to let his voters know that he has never changed his goal to serve the community and fight for their equal rights, including advocating hard to have more college admission slots for students both in University of California and State University systems.

In June 2020, Ting admitted to having a years-long affair with Carmel Foster, a domestic worker whom he met through a dating website. Ting has apologized to his family and the community. He also issued a statement denying the affair had any influence on his voting record.

Ting is currently the Chair of the Assembly Committee on Budget and is the first Asian-American in both the state Assembly and Senate history to hold the chair position. In an interview with Wind Newspaper, he does not want to mention the affair. He emphasizes that he has a lot of plans to do in his next term in State Capital.

As a state assembly budget chair, Ting has played an important role on the state budget. He endorses Proposition 16, the state measure in the November 3 election for the voters to decide if California should overturn Proposition 209 to bring back Affirmative Action Program. The Chinese community in northern and southern California have organized rallies and protests to voice their opposition to Proposition 16.

“Proposition 16 is not only about college admissions. It is also about small business, glass ceiling and public contracting,” Ting said. He is well aware of the Chinese community focusing on college admissions, but the students still need to face the hiring and glass ceiling barriers on employment after graduating from colleges.

Ting has two daughters who will go to college in the next few years. He shares the same concerns with other parents. He does not want to see the younger generations having fewer opportunities to be admitted in colleges. Ting states that the real factors for fewer admissions are determined by the campus administrators and funding. The college administrations have offered more admissions to out-of-state students and foreign students who pay higher tuition.

“Since 2008, UC Berkeley has admitted out-of-state students from 10% to 22% now,” Ting says this situation is more happening at three UC campuses, Berkeley, Los Angeles and San Diego.

Ting indicates that he has worked hard to increase the funding for higher education since he has been the budget chair in the Assembly for five years. He is against the state public universities to admit more out-of-state-students. In recent years, two public college systems have eventually offered more admissions that would benefit the Chinese American students.

State University campuses also have fewer students to enroll. Ting says that the State University system has turned away 30,000 students who are qualified to enroll. He has already helped to fund the system to retain 15,000 admissions.

Under the existing law, Ting says he cannot take any action on the employment except California voters would pass Proposition 16 in the November election.

Chinese and Asian officers in the San Francisco Police Department have complained of being discriminated against for promotions. There were only three Asian officers to be promoted among 60 officers at all levels in November 2018. It was the lowest promotion rate for Asian officers in the last 30 years. Some of the Asian officers were skipped for promotion even though they had higher testing scores.

Ting argues that the Asian police officers in the San Francisco Police Department are the typical cases that it is not easy for anyone to step in to take action without the Affirmative Action law.

In private sectors, Ting says that the big corporations have taken steps to recruit and promote more minorities . The corporations call it “ Diversity Program” instead of “Affirmative Action Program”. They realize that a more diverse workforce will be helpful for their businesses.

Looking back at the past eight years in the Assembly, Ting remembers he has been able to secure a budget to save the unstable San Francisco City College in which 40% of the students are Asians. He has helped to fund $250,000 to the San Francisco Chinatown culture program in 2019. He has introduced AB1073 to require the pharmacies to provide bilingual labels for the limited English speaking patients. Ting says he will continue to advocate for the community in his next term in the State Capitol.