Meghann knows that families in California are being priced out by rising rents and utility bills. While workers are struggling to get by, tech giants like NVIDIA and Apple are raking in record profits. It doesn’t have to be this way. California’s $4.1 trillion economy could be used to meet the needs of everyone living in the state. As Controller, Meghann will expose the roots of the affordability crisis and pressure decision makers to act.

Meghann will launch a Statewide Housing Affordability Audit. The audit will identify bulk buyers and corporate landlords — including asset managers and REITs — show where billion-dollar corporations have bought up homes in bulk, and link those purchases to rent hikes and vacancies by zip code.

Meghann will also conduct a California Public Utility Feasibility Study that compares private monopolies like PG&E, SDG&E, and Southern California Edison to nonprofit and public utility providers in California like the Sacramento Municipal Utility District. The study will produce a real cost and reliability analysis, and an implementation roadmap for establishing a California statewide public utility to replace private monopolies, reduce bills, improve service, and end the wildfire crisis.

As a California school bus driver, Meghann knows how the affordability crisis impacts working families. As the Controller of California, she will make sure that the costs of housing, utilities, education, and healthcare are brought under control.

Billionaires own the government in California. Democrats and Republicans alike collect millions of dollars in campaign donations each year, and in exchange, they hand out billions of dollars in public contracts and tax breaks back to those same donors who put them in office. As California Controller, Meghann will be a watchdog for the people, and shine a spotlight on corruption across the state.

Meghann will audit every corporate tax incentive in California. Using city and county disclosure reports she will publish exactly who got what, how much it cost, and what was delivered. The report will show all of the missed promises, and what public money should be taken back from private hands. It will also name the biggest recipients and tally what these tax giveaways cost to each of our communities.

As Controller, Meghann will also sit on the Board of Equalization, where she will expose corporate fraud in the housing market. The Board of Equalization oversees property taxes. Big corporations use shell companies to hide the extent of their property ownership, securing lower tax rates for their wealthy owners — communities lose millions in the cost to their public services like schools and infrastructure, and working class homeowners have to make up the difference. On the Board of Equalization, Meghann will target the underassessment of large corporate property, stop the shell company games, and close the tax loopholes so communities get what they’re owed.

Meghann will protect every public dollar and make sure that our tax money serves the people, not the billionaires.

Healthcare in California is unaffordable. Millions of working class families across our state are skipping doctors’ appointments because of the cost. Meghann believes that everyone in California should have the right to free, high-quality healthcare — regardless of immigration status. As Controller, Meghann will fight to put a clear path to universal healthcare on the table.

Meghann will use the Controller’s office to lead a Universal Healthcare Financing Study. The study will compare what Californians already spend on healthcare across Medi-Cal, Covered California subsidies, public employee benefits, county safety nets and household premiums to a universal single-payer Medi-Cal For All system. It will include a household bill calculator so families can see their savings when premiums and copays are eliminated.

Meghann will also use her seat on the California Franchise Tax Board to tighten enforcement so private insurance companies and drug companies pay what they owe. Every dollar spent on healthcare should go to services, not corporate profits.

Meghann knows firsthand that funding for schools, clinics, and housing is getting slashed while trillions of dollars of profit are flowing into billionaires’ pockets in California. The Trump administration has proposed cutting the Department of Housing and Urban Development by 44 percent, and putting the burden of rental assistance on states, which will drive thousands more into homelessness. Trump has also withheld over $4 billion for K-12 programs nationwide as the 2025-26 school years begins. Meanwhile, California is spending more and more of our tax dollars on militarizing the police, while funding for our social services evaporates year after year. 

Guarantee housing for all

California has a housing crisis. In the last decade, the price of rent has increased by 79% and the cost to buy a home has risen 88%. Soaring costs have driven over 180,000 Californians into homelessness. Meghann is fighting to make sure that everyone in California has access to high-quality, affordable housing.

Wealthy investors in California are using LLCs and bulk purchases to corner the housing market, driving up the cost of buying a home and the price of rent. As Controller, Meghann will prioritize affordable, nonprofit or public ownership of housing by promoting anti-speculation safeguards and permanent affordability on the Tax Credit Allocation Committee and the Debt Limit Allocation Committee. She will make sure that for every tax-credit or grant given out, the Controller’s office publishes the cost per home and delivery timelines.

Fully fund our schools

Every student deserves the right to a quality education. Despite having the largest economy in the nation, California ranks 43rd out of 50 in per-capita spending, with only 3% of our Gross State Product allocated to education. As controller, Meghann will work to double our education budget so that every child has the opportunity to succeed. 

The California Controller serves as the chair of the California Franchise Tax Board. As Chair, Meghann will tighten enforcement on large corporations and high-income tax avoidance which drain both the California General Fund and local school funding.

Meghann will also use the Controller’s office to support and expand Proposition 47, the Safe Neighborhoods and Schools Act. Prop 47 reduces state incarceration rates from nonviolent misdemeanors and directs the savings to treatment and crime diversion, K-12 truancy and dropout prevention, and victim services. Meghann will publish an annual Prop 47 Savings and Outcomes Report that shows county by county how much the state saved, how much was transferred, and what results it was able to produce in classrooms, clinics, and diversion programs.

Challenge the extreme excesses in police spending at state and local levels

Every year, local police departments in California spend millions of tax dollars on advanced military equipment. Police departments are increasingly acting more like foreign armies and treating our communities like an occupied population. This strategy exacerbates social problems like poverty and inequality, and drains funds from the social programs that help address the root causes of crime.

As Controller, Meghann will develop a Police Department Militarization Database to track spending on military equipment and irresponsible spending on overtime per department. Californians will see which vendors and equipment are funded with our tax dollars. She will recommend grant conditions that prohibit spending on military gear and collaboration with ICE, and require investments in proven safety strategies like crisis response, youth programs, and housing.

Meghann will put our public money where it belongs: in homes and classrooms, not in corporate giveaways to private investment firms and weapons manufacturers.

As Controller, Meghann will fight to protect our pensions and our communities.

Genocide is not only morally unacceptable, it is also a bad investment. The California State Controller sits on the boards of CalPERS and CalSTRS, two pension funds worth over $800 billion. Right now, that money is being sent out of California. Instead of investing those funds into local California jobs and services, our pensions are being used to fuel the ongoing genocide in Gaza. 

We don’t need to invest in militarized wars to secure our retirement. Since 2023, the state of Israel has killed more than 65,000 people in the Gaza Strip, including 28,000 women and 17,900 children. Every hospital in Gaza has been bombed. The UN reports famine and starvation conditions, as international food aid is being blocked by Israel. In September 2025, the UN Commission found that Israel is committing a genocide of the Palestinian people in Gaza. 

The money that Californians hold in our state pension accounts is being used to fund that genocide. CalPERS holds nearly $400 Million in Lockheed Martin, whose missiles, fighter jets, and precision-guided bombs are being used to level apartment buildings, schools and hospitals and Gaza. CalSTRS has significant holdings in Elbit Systems and Caterpillar, whose products are being used to bomb civilians and bulldoze neighborhoods in Gaza. 

As Controller, Meghann will introduce a California Reinvestment Plan for CalPERS and CalSTRS to divest our holdings in companies participating in war crimes and reinvest it into California’s economy. Broad market analysis shows that investments in controversial weapons manufacturers provide no financial benefit over index performance, and they introduce significant legal and reputational risk for investors. Meghann will publish a fiduciary analysis that shows returns, risk, and costs of a divestment plan versus the status quo. She will redirect capital into social housing, community energy and storage, school modernizations, water and wildfire resilience, and transit.

Meghann will protect retirees, and invest our money in homes, jobs, and services here in California. We can and must secure our retirement without investing in genocide.

Climate change is here, and working people are suffering its effects the hardest. In the Bayview neighborhood of San Francisco — a low-income, largely Black community — families live next to toxic shipyard cleanup sites, children breathe polluted air, and residents suffer worse health outcomes than those in the rest of the city. Wildfires exacerbated by extreme drought have torn through California, killing hundreds and displacing hundreds of thousands. While communities pay, polluters profit.

California is failing to meet its climate goals. Our government has promised 100 percent clean energy by 2045, however we are not even on track to reach one quarter of our 2030 clean energy target. Without faster development of renewable energy, the effects of climate change will only become more pronounced.

As Controller, Meghann will conduct a Climate Audit and publish an Energy Transition Report that puts a concrete path to net zero carbon emissions on the table. The audit will inventory every refinery, gas plant, pipeline, and oil well, set closure timelines and cleanup costs, and map the workforce transition by county, as well as the money spent on lobbying and political influence by our state’s biggest polluters. The transition report will identify the five and ten year build targets for clean power and storage, and show the financing gap and how to close it.

Meghann will also use her seats on the boards of CalPERS and CalSTRS to move money out of fossil fuels. CalSTRS currently keeps $4 billion tied up in oil and gas investments. Meghann will fight to make sure this money is reallocated into clean energy and transit projects in California.