Founder and Advisor:   Lawrence J. McQuillan
Director:   Kristian Fors
Policy Research Associate:   Jonathan Hofer

The California Golden Fleece® Awards are a series of in-depth reports from the Independent Institute that expose waste, fraud, and abuse in California on the state or local level. To receive this ignoble designation, a program, agency, policy, tax, or regulation must violate common-sense principles of responsible government, be considered wasteful by people of varying political philosophies, and must be well documented. On occasion, the awards also spotlight a federal program that disproportionately harms Californians.

We encourage people—both inside and outside of government—to send us Fleece candidates. Public participation will help make the California Golden Fleece® Awards a more valuable resource for exposing government waste, increasing transparency, and holding government at all levels accountable when they swindle taxpayers or break the public trust.

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Winner: Winter 2024/25

For its harmful impact on civil liberties and justice, the Independent Institute has awarded its fifteenth California Golden Fleece® Award to the CalGang database and California’s gang laws—especially Penal Code Section 182.5—which have blurred the line between innocence and guilt.

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Winner: Winter 2023/24

Politicians and regulators have earned the Independent Institute’s fourteenth California Golden Fleece® Award for policies that break the public trust by undermining market competition and increasing retail gasoline prices, all the while blaming and shaming oil and gasoline producers and marketers for problems that government officials created through their policy choices.

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Winner: Summer 2022

For adopting automated license plate readers without proper safeguards to protect public privacy and public safety, jurisdictions and police departments with ALPR operations have earned the thirteenth California Golden Fleece® Award.

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Winner: Winter 2021/22

For operating a dangerous, dirty, unreliable, and financially reckless public transportation system in the San Francisco Bay Area, the Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) system has received the twelfth California Golden Fleece® Award.

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It’s Time to Rethink BART Expansion, by Lawrence J. McQuillan and Hovannes Abramyan

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Winner: Spring 2021

For adopting automated license plate readers without proper safeguards to protect public privacy and public safety, jurisdictions and police departments with ALPR operations have earned the thirteenth California Golden Fleece® Award.

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Emergency Reforms Worth Keeping, by Lawrence J. McQuillan and Jonathan Hofer
How to Make the COVID Vaccine Fast-Track the New Standard, by Lawrence J. McQuillan and Jonathan Hofer
How a Reformed FDA Can Speed Up Delivery of Lifesaving Drugs, by Lawrence J. McQuillan

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Winner: Summer 2020

For failing to update antiquated technology and wasting billions of dollars and many years on doomed IT projects, the California Department of Technology and other departments responsible for upgrading state IT systems have been named recipients of the tenth California Golden Fleece® Award.

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Winner: Winter 2019/20

For preventing housing development, which would alleviate sky-high housing prices and growing homelessness, California state and local politicians, government planners and regulators, and NIMBY activists have been named recipients of the ninth California Golden Fleece® Award.

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Winner: Summer 2019

For pursuing faulty incentives that impeded fire prevention and the widespread adoption of scientific techniques to prevent, detect, and quickly suppress wildfires, several government agencies have been named recipients of the eighth California Golden Fleece® Award.

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Trump and Newsom Think Alike on Deadly Wildfires, by Lawrence J. McQuillan
If You Love Forests, Let Them Burn, by William F. Shughart II and Brian Isom

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Winner: Winter 2018/19

For long lines, employees sleeping on the job, and severe mishandling of voter registrations, disability placards, driver’s licenses, and REAL IDs, the California Department of Motor Vehicles has won the Independent Institute’s seventh California Golden Fleece® Award.

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California’s DMV Drives Us Crazy, Reforms Are Needed, by Lawrence J. McQuillan
Time for California’s DMV to Enter the 21st Century, by Lawrence J. McQuillan and Megan E. Sarsfield

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Winner: Fall 2018

For using taxpayer money to settle sexual misconduct claims and shielding the abuse from the public using special laws, offending lawmakers and government employees have been named recipients of the sixth California Golden Fleece® Award.

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Winner: Summer 2018

For unleashing a crime wave on property owners, California’s Proposition 47 has been named the fifth recipient of the California Golden Fleece® Award. To secure justice and restore public confidence, lawmakers should enact stiffer penalties for property crimes, and law enforcement should prioritize “smash-and-grab” vehicle break-ins and retail shopliftings.

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Winner: Fall 2017

For its reckless mismanagement of Oroville Dam—which caused a near catastrophe in February 2017—California’s Department of Water Resources (DWR) has been named the fourth recipient of the California Golden Fleece® Award. Ownership of DWR dams should be transferred to responsible private parties as part of a modernization of the state’s outdated legacy water system.

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No More Patch and Pray—Privatize Oroville Dam, by Lawrence J. McQuillan, Hayeon Carol Park

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Winner: Spring 2017

The California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection—CAL FIRE—has won the third California Golden Fleece® Award due to poor handling of fire safety and costs, severe lack of accountability to taxpayers and landowners, and numerous scandals.

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Cal Fire Must Prioritize Prevention, by Lawrence J. McQuillan

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Winner: Summer 2016

The California Department of Transportation (Caltrans) has won the second California Golden Fleece® Award for its waste of taxpayer money, while at the same time demanding more funding. Caltrans should be drastically scaled back as part of broader reforms to modernize California’s highways.

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Winner: Spring 2016

The California High-Speed Rail Authority has won the first California Golden Fleece® Award for its lack of transparency and history of misleading the public about key details of the state’s “bullet-train” project, which no longer reflect what voters approved in 2008.

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Winners List

 

Events Date
Sr. Fellow Lawrence McQuillan, director of the California Golden Fleece® Awards to speak at Vistage Key Executive Leadership & CEO Network at Sonoma State University Dec. 16-17 Thu., Dec. 12, 2019
“Taxpayer Toolkit: Is the DMV really fleecing Californians? featuring Lawrence McQuillan” Sr. Fellow Lawrence McQuillan, director of the California Golden Fleece® Awards speaks to the Silicon Valley Taxpayers Association in Santa Clara, CA Thu., Jun. 27, 2019
Sr. Fellow Lawrence McQuillan, director of the California Golden Fleece Awards speaks at West Valley Republican Women Federated in San Jose, CA on Thursday, May 16 Fri., May. 17, 2019
Senior Fellow Lawrence McQuillan speaks on the California Golden Fleece Award to the Piedmont Area Republican Women’s Federation in Oakland, CA on March 13, 2019 Wed., Mar. 13, 2019
“California is Getting Fleeced” Sr. Fellow Lawrence McQuillan, director of the California Golden Fleece Award speaks at the Piedmont Area Republican Women Federated in Piedmont, CA March 13, 2019 Wed., Mar. 13, 2019
Sr. Fellow Lawrence McQuillan, creator of the California Golden Fleece Awards and author of California Dreaming speaks at the Sonoma Rotary Club, Sonoma, CA Wed., Sep. 26, 2018
Senior Fellow Lawrence McQuillan, creator of the California Golden Fleece Awards presents at the Rossmoor Republican Club on Sept. 17, 2018 Mon., Sep. 17, 2018
Sr. Fellow Lawrence McQuillan to speak at Rotary Club of Sonoma Valley about the California Golden Fleece Awards on November 2, 2016 Wed., Nov. 2, 2016
Sr. Fellow Lawrence McQuillan, Founder and Director of the California Golden Fleece Awards to speak at the Sonoma County Taxpayers’ Association in Santa Rosa, CA on Thursday, July 21 Thu., Jul. 21, 2016
Sr. Fellow Lawrence McQuillan, Founder and Director of the California Golden Fleece Awards to speak at the Economic Roundtable of San Francisco on Wednesday, July 20 Wed., Jul. 20, 2016
Sr. Fellow Lawrence McQuillan, author of California Dreaming to speak at the California Liberty Summit in Fresno, California Fri., May. 20, 2016