Since I am not back in California, this post will contain my thoughts on the Propositions and Candidates for the November 2012 election. So if you are not interested in my thoughts on this issue, please skip on by. I promise you will only see stuff like this once an election. :)
Content after the break.
Resources
First up, some resources for you to do some of your own research:
To see who is funding each ballot initiative:
- Follow the Money: http://www.followthemoney.org/database/StateGlance/state_ballot_measures.phtml?s=CA&y=2012
- Project Map Light: http://votersedge.org/california/ballot-measures/2012/november
For impartial information and analysis on the propositions:
- The Smart Voter Project from the League of Women Voters (national): http://www.smartvoter.org/2012/11/06/ca/state/prop/
- The "California Votes" from the Education Fund of the League of Women Voters of California: http://cavotes.org/vote/ballot-measures
Propositions
Prop 30: No
- I'm not against the higher taxes (in general) as I think voters have tied up so much state funding with propositions that we either eliminate past propositions or raise taxes. But I don't like some the constitutional changes here.
Prop 31: NO, NO, NO
A
terrible idea. It makes an already badly managed state even harder to
manage. It doesn't just affect the state government, but all local
governments too. Among its many faults:
- It actually adds a bunch of bureaucracy on current programs.
- Mandates a 2-year fiscal period. In theory it makes it easier for budgets to pass. In reality makes it harder for the legislature to react to changing conditions.
- Sets aside 0.035% of all state revenues into a "Performance and Accountability Trust Fund" to help counties with their "Action Plans". The value of 0.035% cannot decline from current levels. If tax receipts decline the state general fund will need to pay in more money to keep the amount at the 2013 level minimum. (Yet ANOTHER carve out of the general fund)
- Requires ANY appropriation from the general fund that is NOT part of the budget bill to be passed in each house by a 2/3rd majority.
- Also requires that all such appropriations be passed in a bill which has ONLY 1 appropriation for ONLY 1 purpose. In theory, not a bad idea. But this means any change to a passed budget due to changing fiscal situations could force the legislature to pass hundreds of individual bills if they need to change the funding for hundreds of individual programs.
- Gives local governments the ability to "opt-out" of state laws and regulations as they write what they (the local entity) think is an "equivalent" regulation and the state legislature has 60 days to OVERTURN that resolution or it goes into effect (over-riding state laws). EVERY local government body (cities, counties, water districts, school districts) can do this, which could easily result in the legislature spending 80% of it's time voting on overturning these "opt-outs". This also works for agencies that create rules and regulations, which would force agencies to have to dedicate a substantial amount of their staff time analyzing and reviewing all of these regulatory "opt-outs" rather than doing what they should be.
- Take this statement "State and local government agencies must set measurable outcomes for all expenditures and regularly and publicly report progress toward those outcomes". How do you set a measurable outcome on fire protection for example? X number of fires fought per year? If there is a wet year and not enough fires are present, do fire districts have to go out and set fires in order to justify their current level of funding? These statements need to be included in every budget (for every state-funded program) which happen every even-numbered year. I agree with some of the ideas, but tying these items into the budget for EVERY state and local entity is just going to make the budgets that much harder to create, debate, and pass.
- Or the requirement that any statute enacted can't go into effect until January 1st of the following year, counted from 90 days after the bill is passed (meaning any bill passed in the last 3 months of a calendar year, 2012 for example, can't go into effect until January 1, 2014). This essentially prevents the state legislature from responding immediately to issues requiring new legislation.
- Or this: "Within one year of the effective date of this provision, a review schedule shall be established for all state programs whether managed by a state or local agency implementing state-funded programs on behalf of the State. The schedule shall sequence the review of similar programs so that relationships among program objectives can be identified and reviewed. The review process shall result in recommendations in the form of proposed legislation that improves or terminates programs. Each program shall be reviewed at least once every five years." That sounds like a decent idea in theory, but what it really means is that any highly-performing state function (if there are any) will be terminated if they can't figure out a way to make it even more effective. Essentially, punishing those government programs that do well by making it harder for them to show this mandatory improvement. Also, how do you measure effectiveness of some programs (like mental health care, etc)? And if you can't review EVERY program in that first 1 year, apparently those unreviewed programs are supposed to be cancelled (reading between the lines here, the proposition is vague as there are only 2 options presented: show how to improve or cancel).
- The $25 mil threshold is way too low. That's almost every expenditure the state has. Buying gas for CHP would require the legislature to add or subtract funding elsewhere, EVEN IF FUNDING IS ALREADY AVAILABLE.
- Prevents new laws from being considered more than once in a two-year period if they are "substantially the same" and failed to pass the legislature once already in the first year of the 2-year period. That's a BROAD statement that could effectively end consideration of bills that the legislature wants to pass (due to changing conditions or whatever) if anything similar has been considered and voted on already.
- Prevents the legislature from passing any bills after November 15th of the 2nd-year of the biennel session. This is intended for "lame-duck" sessions, but has the effect of preventing the state legislature from responding to emergencies or other needs for a 6-week period every 2 years.
Prop 32: No
They might as well call this the "Give Corporations and the Wealthy total power in California" Act.
17%
of California workers belong to a union. So this disproportionately
affects unions ability to represent workers. Corporations don't deduct
from payroll to fund their political donations anyway. So really this
is ONLY targeting unions. And while I disagree with a lot the political acts of unions, at the moment they are among the only entities with sufficient capital to combat the influence of corporations and the extremely wealthy.
I'm
not a fan of unions, but in most cases you don't have to join a union.
If you don't like their political contributions, don't join. And the
thing about not allowing corporations to take from employee paychecks is
BS as they can't do that now. An equivalent would be to require that
all corporations get pass a resolution from all stockholders allowing
the corporations to spend any money for political donations (including
to PACs, etc). All this is designed to do is make it easier for
corporations to influence elections with less opposition.
Even the League of Women Voters (who are normally non-partisan) came out against this one.
Prop 33: NO
- This is entirely funded by the insurance companies in California and is a way to allow them to skirt regulations and raise prices based on factors not related to a persons history as a driver.
- Using myself as an example, because I am living overseas and not maintaining continuous auto insurance coverage, when I return to California my rates could be increased over what would be allowed based on my driving history just because I have not maintained continuous coverage.
- Any lapse in continuous auto insurance of 90 days or more in the previous 5 years (except due to military service or loss of employment) would be a cause of insurers to raise your rates, no matter how good your driving record is.
Prop 34: Yes
- I am actually a believer in the death penalty. I think there are times it is completely called for. But the last 10-15 years have shown overwhelmingly that the criminal justice system in the US does NOT do a good job far too many death penalty cases.
- Even "eye witness testimony" has proven to be frequently wrong (it's been proven so wrong that some judges are considering no longer allowing eye-witness testimony to prove "beyond a reasonable doubt").
- Not only have more than 100 people sentenced to death been shown innocent and taken off death row, there is a very strong probably that several innocent people have been put to death already in the US. And there is at least a decent possibility of it in California.
- So if the choice is between sentencing a few innocent people to death in return for sentencing a few people who deserve it to death, I have to come down on the side of the innocent. Forget the costs issue, although given the California budget it's not irrelevant. If you can't guarantee that no innocent person will be put to death, then the death penalty simply is not morally defensible.
Prop 35: NO, NO, NO
- This is one of those propositions that on the face of it seem like a good idea, but which is TERRIBLY written. There are lots of good ideas in this proposition, although I really wonder if they need to be in a proposition and not just handled by the legislature. Given how much they all love to prove that "they are strong on law enforcement and justice" I don't see that as being an issue. But there are some serious flaws in the proposition.
- Take this "(a) Any person who deprives or violates the personal liberty of another with the intent to obtain forced labor or services, is guilty of human trafficking and shall be punished by imprisonment in the state prison for 5, 8, or 12 years and a fine of not more than five hundred thousand dollars ($500,000)." Notice that there are no exceptions in there? In theory, this could make prison guards "human traffickers" if inmates are forced to work.
- Or "Any person who causes, induces, or persuades, or attempts to cause, induce, or persuade, a person who is a minor at the time of commission of the offense to engage in a commercial sex act, with the intent to effect or maintain a violation of Section 266, 266h, 266i, 266j, 267, 311.1, 311.2, 311.3, 311.4, 311.5, 311.6, or 518 is guilty of human trafficking". There is no inclusion of knowledge on the part of the "offender" or a minimum age of the "offender".
- Which leads to this "“Minor” means a person less than 18 years of age" and this "Mistake of fact as to the age of a victim of human trafficking who is a minor at the time of the commission of the offense is not a defense to a criminal prosecution under this section." Like it or not, prostitution happens in California. I'm not sure that a "john" who thought they were paying for an adult prostitute who happened to really be 17 should be convicted as a human trafficker.
- Think that's not vague enough, how about this: "“Commercial sex act” means sexual conduct on account of which anything of value is given or received by any person." Notice how broad that statement is? There are no further clarification or limits. So guess what, under that definition if you have sex with your significant other after receiving a gift of ANY value, YOU are participating in a "Commercial Sex Act" under the law. Buy someone a drink at the bar and later have sex? You're partaking in a "Commercial Sex Act".
- And if you think I'm overstating the situation, don't forget there are several "registered sex offenders" out there who were 18 year olds having sex with their 17 year-old girlfriends.
- There was the case where two 14 year old boys were made to become a registered sex offender because the judge interpreted the law as written. http://www.njlawattorney.com/Articles/14-Year-Old-Boys-Subject-To-Lifetime-Sex-Offender-Registration.shtml
- Or the 13-year old girl who was both a victim and offender in the same case and became a registered sex offender for having sex with her 12-year old boyfriend. http://www.denverpost.com/ci_4783650
- Lastly, given Prop 36, don't forget that under this law "human trafficking" is a felony conviction that will subject you to 3 strikes laws. Have sex with your SO after receiving a gift on your anniversary 3 years in a row and be prosecuted (extreme example, I know)? Go to jail for life (as this is written). More realistically, is pandering really something we want to raise to the level of three-strikes penalty? Even while allowing fraud involving millions of dollars to remain not?
- Please note, I'm not trying to justify any of the acts in the links above. Just pointing out that under poorly written laws, there can be unintended side-effects.
Prop 36: Yes
- I think the 3-strikes law is too broad as is, and this only reduces it's scope a bit. It doesn't go far enough, but it's a start.
Prop 37: Yes, Yes, Yes
This
is a "right to know" proposition for me. People ought to have the
ability to avoid genetically modified foods if they want to. Right now,
that's impossible.
I'm
not thrilled with the part that lets people sue under the civil code,
but I get why it's there. The actual text says "The failure to make any
disclosure required by Section 110809, or the making of a statement
prohibited by section 110809.1, shall each be deemed to cause damage in at least the amount of the actual or offered retail price of each package or product alleged to be in violation."
However, there are LOTS of exemptions that should keep this under control:
- "Food consisting entirely of, or derived entirely from, an animal that has not itself been genetically engineered, regardless of whether such animal has been fed or injected with any genetically engineered food or any drug that has been produced through means of genetic engineering"
- "A raw agricultural commodity or food derived therefrom that has been grown, raised, or produced without the knowing and intentional use of genetically engineered seed or food"
- "Any processed food that would be subject to Section 110809 solely because it includes one or more genetically engineered processing aids or enzymes"
- "Any alcoholic beverage that is subject to the Alcoholic Beverage Control Act"
- "Until July 1, 2019, any processed food that would be subject to Section 110809 solely because it includes one or more genetically engineered ingredients, provided that: (1) no single such ingredient accounts for more than one-half of one percent of the total weight of such processed food; and (2) the processed food does not contain more than 10 such ingredients"
- "Food that an independent organization has determined has not been knowingly and intentionally produced from or commingled with genetically engineered seed or genetically engineered food,"
- "Food that has been lawfully certified to be labeled, marketed, and offered for sale as “organic” pursuant to the federal Organic Food Products Act of 1990 and the regulations promulgated pursuant thereto by the United States Department of Agriculture."
- "Food that is not packaged for retail sale and that either: (1) is a processed food prepared and intended for immediate human consumption or (2) is served, sold, or otherwise provided in any restaurant or other food facility that is primarily engaged in the sale of food prepared and intended for immediate human consumption"
- "Medical food"
Prop 38: No
- Personally, I'm sick and tired of the state being stuck with more and more of school funding. The state paid more than $48 billion to schools last year (about 40% of the entire state budget). This adds another $6 billion on top of that. Schools need to use their current funding better, and more funding needs to come from local property taxes.
- And it's a broad tax increase. If you earn as little as $7,316 per year, you are looking at a 20% increase in your state taxes. Between roughly $17,500 and $27,500, a 17.5% increase in state taxes. $27,500-38,000, an 18.33% increase in state taxes. $48k-100k, a 17.2% increase in state taxes. That's too much of a tax raise on people who are already struggling just to give schools even more money.
- Also, this proposition lets 30% of the revenues go to debt service payments for state debt through 2016-2017, but the additional taxes and additional allocations remain in effect thereafter and can ONLY be changed via another proposition.
Prop 39: Yes
I
remember reading about the budget deal that gave multi-state
corporations the ability to choose how they were taxed at the time it
was agreed in 2009, and I didn't like it then. I think this is a good
change. Take someone like Amazon which has hardly no staff in
California, but which has a ton of sales here. Right now they pay
hardly no CA corporate tax. With this law they, and every other
multi-state corporation, pay taxes under the same rules, no matter what.
I'm
not sure on the idea of creating yet another dedicated fund(Job
Creation Fund) in the budget, but this one seems fairly well written.
Here is an except from the new law:
26206. The following criteria apply to all expenditures from the Job Creation Fund:
(a)
Project selection and oversight shall be managed by existing state and
local government agencies with expertise in managing energy projects and
programs.
(b) All projects shall be selected based on in-state job creation and energy benefits for each project type.
(c)
All projects shall be cost effective: total benefits shall be greater
than project costs over time. Project selection may include
consideration of non-energy benefits, such as health and safety, in
addition to energy benefits.
(d) All projects shall require contracts that identify the project specifications, costs, and projected energy savings.
(e) All projects shall be subject to audit.
(f) Program overhead costs shall not exceed 4 percent of total funding.
(g) Funds shall be appropriated only to agencies with established expertise in managing energy projects and programs.
(h)
All programs shall be coordinated with the California Energy Commission
and the California Public Utilities Commission to avoid duplication and
maximize leverage of existing energy efficiency and clean energy
efforts.
(i)
Eligible expenditures include costs associated with technical
assistance, and with reducing project costs and delays, such as
development and implementation of processes that reduce the costs of
design, permitting or financing, or other barriers to project completion
and job creation.
26208. If the Department of Finance and the Legislative
Also this "A
2010 study by the Legislative Analyst’s Office (LAO) found that “a
higher sales factor (all else equal) is associated with more economic
development” and that switching from the double sales (triple-factor)
method to the single sales factor method “would increase a state’s
manufacturing jobs by about 3.3 percent.” The study argued that
“mandatory single sales could produce an eventual net gain of about
40,000 jobs based on the Franchise Tax Board’s latest cost estimates.”
Although single sales is considered to be of greater benefit to
corporations headquartered in California, a 2009 California Budget
Project (CBP) report said that the benefits would go to a relatively
small number of corporations"
Prop 40: Yes
- A Yes vote just puts the districts drawn the citizens commission into effect. If you vote No they don't go into effect and the state supreme court needs to be engaged to draw them out.
- Vote YES on this one.
Local Ballot Measures
Measure N: Yes
As
someone who spent a lot of time in the San Juan Unified schools, I can
attest that the schools are in DESPERATE need of some serious upgrades.
And nicely, this puts the burden for school improvement where it
belongs, with the local residents.
Yes,
there have been previous bond measures in 1998 and 2002 for the
District but in that time state funding has been cut as state revenues
have fallen, local funding has been cut as property values have fallen,
and yet most schools in the District are probably 50 years old or older.
Caveat: I don't own property in Sacramento, so this does not affect my taxes.
People
President: Obama
- There will likely be at least one Supreme Court Justice to be replaced in this next term. If you want to see any chance of Citizen's United being overturned, Abortion not being banned, and the government not being able to spy on you with immunity because the courts refuse to hold them to account, you better vote for Obama. The Court is too conservative as it is and one more conservative on the court will tip the balance fully to the conservative wing for the next 10-15 years most likely.
- Romney has run for President saying "You don't need details about me or my plans, just look at how bad the other guy is!". That's simply not acceptable for serious consideration. I am disappointed in Obama in lots of ways, but Romney refuses to make himself an actual alternative candidate. His economic "plan" is impossible when it comes to the budget (it literally cannot be done, the numbers don't add up). And when he does get specific, it's stuff I just don't agree with him on.
US Senate: Feinstein (reluctantly)
- The Republican's main platform seems to be to overturn "ObamaCare". I don't like OC because it didn't go far enough, not because it went too far. OC is basically the Republican solution to the health care crisis (and it is a crisis) that was offered back during the Clinton administration and after.
Congress: Ami Bera
- Bera wasn't my choice in the primary, but Lundgren has been a massive disappointment in Congress. I doubt Bera gets elected in this staunch Republican district, but it's worth trying.
State Senate District 1: Julie Griffith-Flatter
- I can't stand Ted Gaines. He's a shining example of why I left the Republican Party.
State Assembly District 6: Beth Gaines
- This is a choice between 2 horrible candidates IMO, brought to us by the stupid "Top 2" law that was passed in the last election. Beth Gaines, like her husband Ted (running for State Senate again) is exactly what I don't like about the modern Republicans. But Pugno is an even more extreme version of Gaines, although the differences are slight. Since there is no "none of the above" option, I'll go with the lesser perceived evil.
San Juan Unified School District: John Edward Hawes, Michael McKibben, and Lucinda Luttgen
- As always, this is a crap shoot. I picked the three who seemed to be the most qualified and who bothered to provide info on themselves.
Director, San Juan Water District: Joe Alessandri, Pam Tobin
- Only 2 candidates bothered to provide info on themselves. So those are the two I voted for.
Director, Orangevale Park and Rec District: Steve Caldwell, Michael Stickney, and Leonard Hawkins
- No idea on any of these, and since I have no complaints on the current parks, I just went with incumbents.
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