As another election approaches, candidates will understandably point to recent successes or failures and lay out their vision for the future. But while elected officials debate crime trends and cite encouraging statistics, many business owners are still asking a simple question: When will commercial, manufacturing and industrial property crime receive the sustained attention it deserves?
For family-owned businesses, manufacturers, contractors and retailers, the public safety conversation isn’t political — it’s personal.
Every burglary, cargo theft, act of vandalism or equipment theft carries real consequences for employees, customers and the communities that rely on those businesses. That’s why, as voters prepare to cast their ballots, California’s potential leaders must recommit themselves to confronting a problem that continues to affect folks in every corner of the state.
State leaders have advanced targeted solutions to address problems such as copper theft, and Gov. Gavin Newsom recently launched a new interagency effort to better coordinate California’s public safety strategy.
Those are worthwhile steps. But for many California business owners, especially family-owned businesses, the view from the storefront, warehouse, jobsite or manufacturing facility tells a different story, and these efforts have not yet translated into relief from the commercial, manufacturing and industrial property crimes that continue to disrupt daily operations.
When a business is victimized, employees worry about their safety, customers lose confidence, operations are disrupted and insurance premiums rise. Owners spend time dealing with police reports, claims and repairs instead of serving customers, creating jobs and adding to the economy.
For many family-owned businesses, a single major theft can wipe out months of hard work and already thin profit margins. This trickles down further to the consumer, making goods and products more expensive — creating frustration from the pump to the produce section.
What’s more, the true scale of the problem is almost certainly larger than official statistics suggest.
Many business owners simply do not report every incident. Some have experienced response times that leave them questioning whether reporting will make a difference. Others are concerned about the time required to navigate reporting processes when staffing is already stretched thin. Others worry that filing a claim will drive up insurance premiums.
The result is an ongoing cycle in which significant amounts of crime go unreported, making the problem appear smaller than it truly is while allowing repeat offenders to continue targeting businesses.
A healthy economy depends on safe communities. Businesses cannot invest, expand and hire with confidence when crime remains an accepted cost of doing business.
Regardless of political affiliation, this reality should concern current and future policymakers, and they must commit to solutions that address commercial, manufacturing and industrial property crime. This means supporting dedicated law enforcement efforts, improving coordination across jurisdictions, strengthening prosecution of organized theft networks and investing in technologies and strategies that help prevent crime before it occurs.
Prevention works when government gets out of the way. When the state streamlined permits for electrified security fencing, wait times dropped from more than a year to under three weeks, and hundreds of businesses moved forward with protecting their property. That law is now permanent. That’s the kind of practical, prevention-first policy that should be the rule, not the exception.
Leaders also need to listen to what voters have already decided.
Nearly 70% of Californians voted for Proposition 36, and it carried all 58 counties. But laws don’t implement themselves. Two years later, many of the counties responsible for carrying out the measure are still waiting for the resources needed to make it work.
Californians voted for action. State leaders should deliver it.
As campaigns intensify and candidates seek voters’ support, business owners should ask a simple question before filling in that little square: What specific steps will you take to reduce commercial, manufacturing and industrial property crime in our community and state?
The answer is what should influence your vote, not the 27th text of the day.
Businesses cannot be left to absorb the costs of crime alone.
This election season presents an opportunity to move beyond declarations of victory and focus on the work that remains unfinished. California voters have already made clear that public safety is a priority.
Xavier Becerra has emphasized prevention, behavioral health and coordinated public safety efforts, while Steve Hilton has called for stronger enforcement, accountability and implementation of Proposition 36. Their approaches differ, but California business owners agree on one thing: They expect the next governor to do more than campaign on public safety.
That means meaningful implementation of the laws already on the books, adequate funding for the communities responsible for carrying them out and a sustained commitment to reducing the impact of crime on families, workers and businesses.
Voters have already spoken. The next governor should follow through.
Robert Rivinius is president of the Family Business Association of California, which has members throughout the state. He lives in Sacramento.
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