John Chiang

John Chiang Party: Democratic Occupation: State controller Age: 47, born in New York City City of residence: Torrance Personal: Married Education: Bachelor's degree in finance, University of South Florida; law degree, Georgetown University Law Center Career highlights: Aide to U.S. Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.), 1992; aide to then-Controller Gray Davis, 1989-91. Elected to State Board of Equalization, 1998. Elected state controller in 2006.

SACRAMENTO - California's teacher retirement system does not take adequate measures to prevent pension "spiking," missing opportunities to reduce such abuses by insufficiently auditing benefits, the state controller said Wednesday. Auditors in Controller John Chiang's office spotted raises of up to 26% for retiring executives in the San Francisco and San Diego school districts without enough documentation to justify the end-of-career boosts. Part of the problem, Chiang said, is that the California State Teachers' Retirement System - the largest in the nation - hasn't taken full advantage of electronic warning systems designed to identify problems.

The race for state controller -- California's powerful chief financial officer -- pits a former legislator against a tax expert, two candidates who agree only that California's $131-billion budget should be free of waste and fraud. A lawyer with a degree in finance, John Chiang, 44, is running on his 10 years of experience as a member of the Board of Equalization, a state panel that administers a variety of tax programs. A Democratic Party activist, he is the board's chairman.

SACRAMENTO — State Controller John Chiang on Monday appealed a recent court decision that said he lacked authority to dock legislators' pay last year after he determined the budget they passed was not balanced. Sacramento County Superior Court Judge David I. Brown ruled May 8 that the Legislature met its obligation to continue being paid when it sent the governor a bill that, "on its face," proposed spending that did not exceed revenue. California voters passed a law in 2010 allowing the Legislature to approve state budgets on a simple majority instead of a two-thirds vote.

A judge ruled Thursday that Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has the power to order the 15,600 employees of other elected statewide officials to take furlough days as part of a budget-cutting measure. State Controller John Chiang, who had doubted the governor's authority and asked the court to decide, said he would appeal the ruling.

SACRAMENTO — State Controller John Chiang did not have the authority to dock legislators' pay last summer after concluding that the budget they passed was not balanced, according to a tentative court ruling Tuesday. The Legislature meets its obligation to pass a budget when it sends the governor a bill that, "on its face," proposes spending that does not exceed revenue, wrote Sacramento County Superior Court Judge David I. Brown. He will consider finalizing the ruling at a hearing Wednesday.

Despite two losses in court and a dwindling stock of legal arguments, John Chiang has made himself the roadblock to Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's attempt to ratchet down the paychecks of some 200,000 state employees to minimum wage. Chiang, the state controller, has said the order is illegal. He has said it is impractical. He has said his computers can't do it. Mostly, he's just said no. Through the tussle, the unassuming 47-year-old Democrat has emerged as an unlikely counterweight to the muscle-bound Schwarzenegger.

John Chiang should have been celebrating in January. After defeating 10 candidates in a hotly contested primary for a seat on California's Board of Equalization and easily winning the general election, the Chatsworth resident was beginning his first full term on the board of the state agency. But shortly after Chiang was sworn in, a distressing phone call from his brother cast a shadow over his success: Their only sister, Joyce, had mysteriously disappeared Jan.

Forensic tests will determine whether the decomposed body found along the Potomac River in southern Fairfax County last week is that of Joyce Chiang, the Immigration and Naturalization Service lawyer who disappeared from Dupont Circle on Jan. 9, the FBI said Tuesday. Chiang is the sister of John Chiang, a Chatsworth resident who was elected last fall to the California state Board of Equalization.

As a high school kid in Illinois, John Chiang ran for student council on a populist platform: ridding the lunchroom jukebox of disco music. "That was the major wedge issue," recalled a friend who was his campaign partner. Disco was fading. Punk and new wave were coming in. They won. Chiang, now the Golden State's controller, became vice president of the student body -- a notable achievement for one of the school's few Asian kids and the target of name-calling and racial slurs.

SACRAMENTO — State Controller John Chiang did not have the authority to dock legislators' pay last summer after concluding that the budget they passed was not balanced, according to a tentative court ruling Tuesday. The Legislature meets its obligation to pass a budget when it sends the governor a bill that, "on its face," proposes spending that does not exceed revenue, wrote Sacramento County Superior Court Judge David I. Brown. He will consider finalizing the ruling at a hearing Wednesday.

Californians: Do you know who John Chiang is? You should, because you inadvertently made him one of the most powerful people in the state. If you guessed that Chiang is the Golden State's controller, you get high marks (and extra wonk credit if you can list what, precisely, the controller does). Chiang became much more controlling than the average controller after voters passed Proposition 25 in November 2010, the initiative that wisely did away with the two-thirds vote requirement for the Legislature to pass a budget.

Reporting from Sacramento -- Democratic lawmakers sued state Controller John Chiang on Tuesday, arguing that he misused his power last summer when he docked their pay for passing a budget he said was not balanced. The lawsuit, filed in Sacramento County Superior Court, does not seek reimbursement of the $583,200 in withheld pay. Lawmakers want the court to bar the controller from doing it again if they approve a budget that they deem balanced. Chiang, a Democrat, said he was exercising authority given to him by voters when they approved Proposition 25, a constitutional amendment, in 2010.

The state controller's fourth and final audit of financially troubled Montebello found the city's internal controls severely lacking, opening the door to waste and possible malfeasance. Controller John Chiang said the lapses in Montebello were so severe that he compared them to those in Bell, a city that has become synonymous with mismanagement and allegations of public corruption. The audits didn't allege criminal wrongdoing in Montebello but did find serious lapses. "While the roots of Montebello's problems are different from Bell's, they both share the common trouble of having little or, at times, no accountability in their spending of public dollars," Chiang said.

An engineering firm at the center of a federal bribery investigation awarded about $2 million in contracts to itself under an arrangement with the city of Montebello that state auditors found to be improper. Montebello hired AAE to serve as its city engineer, with the power to pick outside firms to do various engineering jobs for the city. But state Controller John Chiang's office found in an audit released Tuesday that AAE awarded all the work to itself and then approved its own invoices and oversaw its own compliance, which Chiang called "a potential conflict of interest.

State auditors have urged the Los Angeles Community College District to seek a criminal investigation into allegations that the selection of an inspector general to police the district's troubled construction program was rigged. Jeffrey Brownfield, chief auditor for state Controller John Chiang, told the district's Board of Trustees that an independent probe was needed to determine how the district allegedly violated its own bidding rules in choosing someone with no experience in audits or investigations over higher-rated applicants.

In the race for controller, both major candidates have held responsible positions in state government but neither is a household name. However, the job that John Chiang and Tony Strickland seek is a platform that has launched a number of notable careers in California politics, including those of former Gov. Gray Davis and the late Sen. Alan Cranston.

This is in response to "Giving Your Vacation Break to Katrina Victims" (Sept. 18) describing new federal tax benefits for employees who would like to donate the cash value of their vacation, sick time or personal leave to the victims of Hurricane Katrina. I would like to inform you that state Controller Steve Westly and I have announced that the Franchise Tax Board will conform its policies to the temporary IRS rule discussed in your article. In other words, the tax benefits recently enacted by the IRS also are available in California.

Tending to children Re "S. Korean pastor's unwanted flock," June 20 Once again your publication reminds me why I have read and will continue to subscribe to The Times as long as it continues its existence. I know from personal experience that almost no one cares about disabled kids such as these besides their parents. In the cases described in your article, even their parents don't want them — and the South Korean government is protesting? What it should be doing is giving this beautiful individual all the support and funding he requires to improve his facility.

Alternatives to burial Re "Replacing trees with stones," June 17 Where is the forest in "Forest" Lawn? I think the Hollywood Hills cemetery is missing a business opportunity in choosing to cut down a forest of oaks, sycamores and walnuts to make way for more casket burial plots. Many of us baby boomers seek an alternative to the environmental impact of traditional burial. Forest Lawn President and Chief Executive Darin B. Drabing says it is a human impulse to say "remember me. " Personally, I would prefer that my grandchildren walk in a forest and remember that I was thinking of them when I rejected a casket in the ground for a living tree (a small plaque would do)