Is Arnold in hot water, again?
Between June 23rd and June 30th I provided a heads up on five of the ten statewide Ballot Measures that will appear on our Nov 2nd ballots.
Perhaps the most critical of that group being Prop 23. This Measure, known as the “California Jobs Initiative,” calls for suspension of AB32 where implementation of AB32 will be blocked until we have four consecutive quarters with state unemployment rates at or below 5.5 percent.
While we see reports that our national unemployment rate is currently at 9.5%, the “percentage of our state’s labor force that is unemployed, not seasonally adjusted, was 12.3% for the month of April.”
The other Measures previously addressed were related to legalizing marijuana (Prop 19), requiring a simple majority to pass any late budget (Prop 25), block raiding from city coffers (Prop 22) and most recently expansion of redistricting to include congressional races (Prop 20) and an effort to eliminate the Citizens Redistricting Commission that has been assigned the number (Prop 27).
Timing is everything. “A California Water Bond, Proposition 18 is on the November 2, 2010 ballot in California as a legislatively-referred state statute. The measure is known by its supporters as the Safe, Clean, and Reliable Drinking Water Supply Act of 2010. If voters approve, the water bond proposition will allow the state government to borrow $11.1 billion to overhaul the state’s water system.”
There is no question that Californians need to face the music as it relates to that finite resource called water. However, governor Schwarzenegger, sensing rejection by the voters, is currently lobbying our legislature to postpone, until 2012, the Nov $11.1 billion Water Bond Ballot Measure as we simply cannot afford to add billions in new debt when we continue having $19 billion budget deficits. The Register reports that it will require a 2/3rds vote of the Legislature by August 12th to remove this Measure from the Nov 2nd election.
Note: “As of July 1, 2009 the state had $67.09 billion in outstanding debt on General Fund backed-bonds already sold.” Source. Executive summary http://www.treasurer.ca.gov/publications/2009dar.pdf
Another report states that as of Jan 2010 our total state Bond Debt was $89 billion.
As we still have four months until the election I will not address the remaining issues until later in the summer or early fall.
The 10 ballot measures are identified as follows:
Proposition 18 – Water bond.
Proposition 19: Legalize and tax marijuana.
Proposition 20 – Redistricting for Congress.
Proposition 21 – Vehicle license fee for parks.
Proposition 22 – Bans State from borrowing or redirecting local funds.
Proposition 23: Suspends AB32.
Proposition 24: Repeals corporate tax benefits.
Proposition 25: Majority vote for passing a budget.
Proposition 26: Two-thirds vote for approving fees.
Proposition 27: Eliminates redistricting commission.
Closing comment. Knowing our current financial status and considering future priorities, how many readers would like to revisit the Nov 2008 Prop 1 A High Speed rail vote which at $9.95 billion dollars was almost the same total as the pending Water Bond.
Everyone in our state needs access to safe, reliable drinking water. How many Californians will ride the CAHSR if it ever is built?
Let me remind our readers that voters in Orange, Riverside and San Diego County all said no way to the Curt Pringle Express.
Larry,
Nice report. On the water bond front, I could go on for hours about the pros and cons of the bond, but the most glaring problem for us down here in SoCal is the fact that not a single penny of that $11 billion would go towards to most needed infrastructure project – the peripheral canal in the delta that would go a long way toward providing critical water supplies to us.