State Senator Henry Stern is currently the youngest member of the California state Senate, and he brings a millennial’s perspective to the often hidebound legislative body that he serves.
Stern represents District 27, which includes most of the Santa Monica Mountain range in addition to the San Fernando Valley. Stern, a Democrat, ran on an environmental platform that carried him to an impressive victory over Republican opponent Steve Fazio in November, 2016, earning the first-term senator the seat vacated by his mentor, Senator Fran Pavley.
Stern has vowed to continue to further Pavley’s groundbreaking work on pollution, conservation and social justice, but he also brings a futurist’s perspective to his district and his generation’s perspective on technology.
He has hit the ground running. His current agenda includes working to shut down the Aliso Canyon gas storage facility that poisoned a Porter Ranch neighborhood with methane, and collaborating with other lawmakers, including California Senate Leader Kevin de León on the California Environmental Defense Act, a bill package intended to protect the state’s environmental and worker protections from government rollbacks.
Stern recently shared some of his vision for the future of his district and the state with an audience of students and the public at a Pepperdine University School of Public Policy talk.
“You don’t have to wait to change California or this country or the whole world,” Stern told his audience. “Ideas scale faster than they’ve ever scaled; the rate of change is faster than it has ever been.”
One of Stern’s goals is to find ways to increase voter participation. “We’re looking at ways to encourage high school students to become engaged in politics and vote,” he said. “All of that potential energy is left on the shelf.”
Stern said he sees technology, including two-way digital interface with government, as a key to encouraging young people to “cultivate the habit of voting.” According to Stern, Proposition 54’s legislature live-streaming requirement is a big step in that direction. “I’m excited,” he said. “I think it will shake things up.”
Stern also discussed housing and transportation, two issues that are among his priorities. He pointed to rapidly rising real estate and rental costs and raised the concern that many are being priced out of the housing market.
Stern told the audience that he’s given up his car and is learning to depend on public transportation and ride-sharing services, something he sees as increasingly the future of transportation.
He also discussed the conflict between the need to protect open space, the need for affordable housing, and how development should ideally be concentrated near public transportation hubs
“It’s hard to get by,” he said. “Disposable income is soaked up by housing. I don’t want concrete over our whole life but we have to build, too. How do you balance that? Sometimes you can’t.”
Stern said he would like to see redevelopment in the San Fernando Valley, rather than new urban sprawl in the surrounding mountains. He suggested that the area surrounding the Orange Line—the bus line that connects the valley to the rest of L.A., and the concrete channel, all that is left of the northern end of the L.A. River, are ideal redevelopment targets.
“We have wild mountains, a coastline second to none,” he said, and stated that he views the sense of wilderness that is present in suburban L.A. as one of the area’s most valuable qualities and suggested that restoring the Valley section of the river would make room for nature and park space as well as housing and public transit.
“We can shape a new L.A.,” he said.
