With retail theft legislation, Robert Rivas strives to chart a new path.

Legislation in the realm of criminal justice has a history in California of swinging back and forth like a pendulum, overcorrecting itself each time. Tough-on-crime gets too tough, locking people away; reformers go too far, allowing crime to get out of hand; and the cycle repeats.

When a squadron of public officials gathered at the Steinbeck Center in Salinas on Monday, Aug. 19, flanking California’s Speaker of the Assembly, Robert Rivas, D-Hollister, they were there to celebrate a specific package of 10 bills addressing a surge in retail theft in California cities. But more than that, they were there to express a belief in Rivas, who soared to the position just over a year ago, and his leadership style. By assembling Democrats and Republicans, career cops and lobbyists, on one stage together, they were there to speak only partly about the specifics of the retail theft package – mostly they were there to say there is a real path to legislate through compromise.

“The process we went through was something I have never experienced before, because it was a bipartisan process. Everyone’s voice had an opportunity to be heard,” said Rachel Michelin, president of the California Retailers Association. “I hope it sets an example for how we can do policy in the future.

“It’s a changed dynamic in how we do policy in Sacramento. To me, that is just as important as passing this package of bills.”

The 10-bill package is intended to be a problem-solver, but of course it is political as well – it is, hopefully, a correction to the pendulum-swinging. Proponents of this legislation oppose Prop. 36 which will be on the ballot in November. (A competing, Democrat-led proposition was dropped as this package came into focus.) Prop. 36 represents exactly the kind of extreme swing back, undoing Prop. 47 reforms of a decade ago, making it easier to charge felonies in theft and drug cases and to incarcerate offenders.

Rivas says he expects that under the retail theft legislation, the census of incarcerated people in California will not rise significantly. This is important for a few reasons. One is that jails and prisons have historically been overcrowded (and Prop. 47 was partly an answer to that problem). Two is a well documented racial disparity in who gets locked up (disproportionately, people of color). Three is that from a moral standpoint, we are failing as a society if we treat everyone who steals as if they are a career criminal. The legislation signed last week makes a serious and thoughtful effort to thread the needle, distinguishing between retail theft masterminds, allowing felony charges – and three-year prison sentences – while expanding diversion programs for low-level offenders.

“We don’t need to go back to things of the past and mass incarceration,” Michelin said.

Instead, the legislation tries to make more surgical changes.

One bill allows prosecutors to work across jurisdictions, even if the theft and the sale happens in different counties. Another bill requires online marketplaces to develop policies prohibiting the sale of stolen goods. One makes it easier for retailers to obtain restraining orders against thieves. One acknowledges root causes by requiring courts to consider rehabilitation: “It gives those caught in a cycle of petty theft a chance to turn their life around,” said Assemblymember Rick Chavez Zbur, D-Hollywood.

“California will not go backwards on criminal justice reforms,” Rivas said. “We have to be deliberate, we have to be smart about the consequences of policy. That’s why we invested so much time and energy to get this right.”

Of course there is another, parallel political saga unfolding on the national stage. A few hours after Rivas’ press conference in Salinas, San Francisco’s former District Attorney, Kamala Harris, took the stage to welcome delegates to the Democratic National Convention in Chicago. Democrats both nationally and in California are striving to prove themselves as the party that can cooperate to get to real and thoughtful solutions.

Here’s hoping at the state level that this group got it right – retail theft matters immensely to preserving downtowns. And if they didn’t, Rivas says, they will revisit it: “If things aren’t working, we have to be willing to go back and fix it.”

SARA RUBIN is the Weekly’s editor. Reach her at sara@montereycountynow.com