Measure B received 44.15% of the votes with 430,488 Angelenos voting yes to a public bank, an astonishing achievement from a grassroots, volunteer-run campaign with minimal funding.
Following the Measure B campaign, we focused 100% of our efforts on building the California Public Banking Alliance (CPBA) coalition and leading the AB 857 campaign, a bill that was drafted and initiated by CPBA and introduced into the California State Legislature in February 2019. Visit californiapublicbankingalliance.org to learn more about our 10-city strong coalition and the Public Banking Act, our California State Assembly bill to create a pathway for cities, counties and regions in California to set up their own public banks. Authored by Assemblymembers Miguel Santiago (Los Angeles) and David Chiu (San Francisco), this 2019 session bill enables the Department of Business Oversight to issue state banking charters to local government agencies.
On October 2, 2019 Governor Newsom signed the Public Banking Act into law, legalizing pubic banking in California for the first time in history. This was also the first progressive banking bill passed as a grassroots, citizen-mobilizing effort, without paid lobbyists.
On October 7, 2019 Los Angeles City Council President Herb Wesson introduced a motion for an RFQ to hire a consultant for the public bank business plan. The motion was presented to the full council and on December 4, 2019, LA City Council approved the motion, voting to move forward with the process to hire a consultant. Approval of this motion now green-lights the Chief Legislative Analyst (CLA)'s next steps: drafting the scope and structure of the RFQ. The CLA was also instructed to report back on the cost of the consultant.
As of February 2020, Public Bank Los Angeles is currently working on a white paper addressing capitalization, lines of business, loans and financial products to support renewable energy infrastructure, banking services for City of LA and other participating members, impact and equity, regulatory purview and phasing, and governance and jurisdiction of the Bank of Los Angeles.