California legislators are attempting to reinstate harsher penalties for shoplifters that steal less than $950 by repealing Proposition 47—a law that downgraded some crimes from felonies to misdemeanors. This week, Chico city council became one of the latest supporters of Assembly Bill 1599—a bill introduced by Assemblymen Kevin Kiley (R-Rocklin), James Gallagher (R-Yuba City), and Jim Patterson (R-Fresno) on Jan. 3 that reimplement harsher criminal penalties that were relaxed by Proposition 47 in 2014. “We watched the crime rates go up every year consistently,” co-author of the bill Assemblywoman Laurie Davies (R-Laguna Niguel) told The Epoch Times. “This is long overdue.” Last month, Assemblyman Rudy Salas (D-Bakersfield) similarly introduced Assembly Bill 1603 to crack down on retail theft in the state by reducing the threshold for petty theft from $950 back to $400, which was the law in California before Proposition 47 was passed. The proposed legislation comes amid a wave of smash-and-grab-type robberies …