One of the most recognizable voices of the North State is set to retire next month after more than 40 years in public service.
Sen. Jim Nielsen will exit the California legislature Nov. 1 because of term limits.
Nielsen, who stopped by the Colusa County Pioneer Review last week following a Town Hall meeting in Glenn County, has carried many titles in his life, including Senate Republican Leader.
Nielsen is best known for being a tough-on-crime conservative and for leading the charge for the Three Strikes Law and Crime Victims Bill of Rights, called Marsy’s Law.
“I’m known as the grandfather of the crime victims movement in California and I despair now because it’s been turned inside out,” he said. “The crime victims are now the criminals and the real victims, who I’ve known by the millions, don’t count anymore.”
Nielsen entered politics as the Yolo County Republican Central Committee chair in the 1970s before being elected to the State Senate in 1978. He was reelected in 1982 and 1986, and held the position of minority leader from 1983 to 1987.
Nielsen championed the cause for lower taxes, controlled government spending, and gun rights for law-abiding citizens. He authored legislation to promote welfare reform and reduce welfare fraud, including the acclaimed welfare-to-work (GAIN) program.
Nielsen championed the California State Long-Term Care Ombudsman Program, which has endured despite the many changes over the years in a Democratic-led legislature.
He was an advocate for North State agriculture, and authored and co-authored bills to promote agricultural exports.
After leaving the legislature in 1990, Nielsen served on the Agricultural Labor Relations Board. In 1992, he was appointed by Governor Pete Wilson to the Board of Parole and Prison Terms and served as its chairman from 1993 until 2000. He was a member of the Youthful Offender Parole Board from 2002-2008.
Nielsen served in the California Assembly from 2009 to 2012, and returned to the State Senate following a 2013 special election.
One of his greatest accomplishments was advancing language for Proposition 1 in 2014, which secured $2.7 billion for water storage to benefit farms, communities, and wildlife.
Nielsen said he would have liked to have seen dirt turned on the Sites Reservoir Project before he left office but smiles at the prospects that it could be built or at least started in his lifetime.
“That was really kind of my baby,” Nielsen said.
Nielsen has received many awards over the years and has been recognized as Legislator of the Year many times by various organizations.
“But it’s never about the awards,” Nielsen said. “It’s not about the plaques on the walls or the pats on the back; it’s about the people’s lives you touch with your life. At the end of your life and you’re facing your maker – that’s what counts; the lives and hearts you touch with your life…and we’ve been able to do a lot of that. I’ve really enjoyed it and it’s as far from the farm as I ever thought I would get.”
For many years, Nielsen said conservatives and liberals were able to reach across the aisle to get things done, but he has seen a big shift in recent years.
“It is much harder now and what really disturbs me is how it’s affecting even small cities,” he said. “Now, it’s getting nasty out here. It doesn’t have to be that way and people shouldn’t accept it.”
Despite his accomplishments, Nielsen despairs that citizens will continue to lose control over their government by turning their power over to the government.
“What I say is the fundamental problem with government in America and even in small cities – and certainly in state government – is the people have lost the power. Elected representatives, governors, and presidents have usurped that power, and, in many cases, such as Prop 47, the people have given the power away. Prop 47 gives license to burglars to take your property and have no consequence.”
And over a longer period of time, the agencies of government have taken power, he added.
“It’s how things get corrupted,” Nielsen said.
At the state level, Nielsen said when a one-party Democrat supermajority cuts Republicans out, as they have done in the past few years, they cut the people represent completely out of the picture.
“There’s no trust,” Nielsen said. “In the last several years, we Republicans have made deals with Democrats. But then the next year, they take our deal out and keep theirs. There’s no trust.”
As Nielsen exits the California Legislature, he urges people to take their power back by getting involved in their communities and acquainting themselves with their representatives so as not to be cut out of the decision-making process.
“You have to talk to them and make them listen,” he said. ■