The modern era
The city's current charter was adopted by voters in 1920, establishing a city council-and-manager form of government, still used today. As a charter city, Sacramento is exempt from many laws and regulations passed by the state legislature. The city has expanded continuously over the years. The 1964 merger of the City of North Sacramento with Sacramento substantially increased its population, and large annexations of the Natomas area eventually led to significant population growth with the housing boom of the 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s.
The Sacramento-Yolo Port District was created in 1947, and ground was broken on the Port of Sacramento in 1949. On June 29, 1963, with 5,000 spectators waiting to welcome her, the Motor Vessel Taipei Victory arrived.[citation needed] The port was open for business. The Nationalist Chinese flag ship, freshly painted for the historic event, was loaded with 5,000 tons of bagged rice for Mitsui Trading Co. bound for Okinawa and 1,000 tons of logs for Japan. She was the first ocean-going vessel in Sacramento since the steamship Harpoon in 1934.
The Port of Sacramento has been plagued with operating losses in recent years and faces bankruptcy. As of 2006, the city of West Sacramento will take full responsibility for the Port of Sacramento. This severe loss in business is due to the heavy competition from the Port of Stockton, which has a larger facility and a deeper channel.
Sacramento City and County (along with a portion of adjacent Placer County) are served by a customer-owned electric utility, the Sacramento Municipal Utility District. Sacramento voters approved the creation of SMUD in 1923. In April, 1946, after 12 years of litigation, a judge ordered Pacific Gas & Electric to transfer title of Sacramento's electric distribution system to SMUD. SMUD today is the sixth-largest public electric utility in the U.S., and has a worldwide reputation for innovative programs and services, including the development of clean fuel resources, such as solar power.
Despite a devolution of state government in recent years, the state of California remains by far Sacramento's largest employer. The City of Sacramento expends considerable effort to keep state agencies from moving outside the city limits. In addition, many federal agencies have offices in Sacramento.
In the early 1990s, Mayor Joe Serna attempted to lure the Los Angeles Raiders football team to Sacramento, selling $50 million cents in bonds as earnest money. When the deal fell through, the bond proceeds were used to construct several large projects, including expanding the Convention Center and refurbishing of the Memorial Auditorium. Serna renamed a city park for controversial farm labor organizer Cesar Chavez. Through his effort, Sacramento became the first major city in the country to have a paid municipal holiday honoring Chavez.
In the late 1990s and early 2000s, Mayor Heather Fargo made several abortive attempts to provide taxpayer financing of a new sports arena for the Maloof brothers, owners of the Sacramento Kings NBA Basketball franchise. In November 2006, Sacramento voters soundly defeated a proposed sales tax hike to finance this, due in part to competing plans for the new arena and its location.
The 1980s and 1990s saw the closure of several local military bases: McClellan Air Force Base, Mather Air Force Base, and Sacramento Army Depot. As a result, the U.S. armed forces have little military presence in the city except for recruiting offices.
In 1967, Governor Ronald Reagan became the last Governor of California to live permanently in the city. A new executive mansion, constructed by private funds in a Sacramento suburb for Reagan, remained vacant for nearly forty years and was recently sold by the state. The California Supreme Court normally sits in San Francisco.
In spite of major military base closures and the decline of agricultural food processing, Sacramento continued to experience massive population growth in the 1990s and early 2000s. Primary sources of population growth are people migrating from the San Francisco Bay Area seeking lower housing costs, as well as immigration from Asia, Central America, Mexico, Ukraine, and the rest of the former Soviet Union. From 1990 to 2000, the population grew 14.7%. The Census Bureau estimates that in four years (2000-2004), the population of Sacramento County increased from 1,223,499 to 1,352,445.
(Source: Wikipedia.org)
