I’m starting early on this because quite a number of the propositions will need a lot of mulling over.
1A - Transportation Funding Protection
Hmm. Prop. 42 back in 2002 already protects the excise tax except under fiscal crises. This one locks excise and sales tax to transportation, regardless of fiscal crisis beyond 2 every 10 years. Pretty strict, especially if sales tax is typically part of the General Fund. I don’t like locking money in when there’s no clear plan on why it’s locked in. Locking in funding is actually kinda dumb, now that I think about it. Funds should be committed if there’s a project ready for the money, not just to arbitrarily commit a portion of revenue every year regardless of how much is actually used. Right now, I’m thinking NO.
1B - Highway Safety, Traffic Reduction, Air Quality, and Port Security
So if I’m voting NO on 1A I still have 1B to consider. Anyone who votes yes on 1A would wonder what 1B is all about. Isn’t there enough money from 1A locking up around $5 billion dollars per year in excise and sales tax that a bond is pointless? Since I’m probably voting NO on 1A, the question remains: do we then borrow money with 1B? Do we really need a large infusion of cash, something needed now, that we take out $20 billion all at once? That’s a big loan. In general, I think a loan is fine provided there’s a detailed laundry list on how it’s spent. People want to know that it will go towards repairing the Pacific Coast Highway, or that it will build a bridge across a certain river, or build a mag-lev train to Vegas, with a condition to take out another loan to continue the line up the coast or something. This one is ambitious, and it does earmark the cash but in generalities like fixing roads and going into public transportation. There are ideas about what it would be spent on if you go read the local newspapers for a region, but none of it is written into the proposition. Like I said, if it was a simple proposition to build a mag-lev system from San Francisco to LA to Vegas, I’d be voting yes in a heartbeat. As it stands, I’m on the fence.
10/31/2006:
I’m now leaning YES. I’m fine with raising taxes, but as most are not, I guess I’m fine paying interest on loans. This amounts to the same thing, but if calling something by any other name makes others feel better, then so be it.
1C - Housing and Emergency Shelter Trust Fund Act of 2006
I wonder if this really will provide low-interest loans for first-time homeowners… will I be one of them? Tentatively YES.
10/31/2006:
I’m going to vote NO. After mulling this over, this is just a state-funded version of the low-interest loans that got all sorts of people into trouble these past couple of years. If you can’t afford a home, don’t buy one. Look, we live in the 21st century. Maybe mom and pop saw owning a home as a sound investment, but we live in a time where we all play the market through 401k/403b investments. Those are far more adaptive to the world market (especially if you apportion wisely) than buying a house and running the risk of losing property value. The housing bubble has burst, and this is just another attempt at covering that burst bubble. NO.
1D - Kindergarten-University Public Education Facilities
Public education gets a knee-jerk reaction of YES, so I had better read this carefully. But yeah, for now, YES.
1E - Disaster Preparedness and Flood Prevention
I live in LA. If those central California water systems fail, I am hosed, along with the rest of Southern California. Hell, even that tightwad McClintock is okaying this one (of course, he’s from Ventura County). YES.
83 - Sex Offenders. Sexually Violent Predators. Punishment, Residence Restrictions and Monitoring.
Why is it that we are not striving to repair our penal system? When someone is free to leave prison, it means they are free to leave prison. If you feel a sex offender remains a danger to society, then you keep that person locked up. Once released, an ex-con should feel liberated, should feel that he or she is a member of society once more. Treating them as a second-class citizen pretty much defeats the entire point of having a prisons. We need something that addresses the problem, not the symptom. I am not spending money of some crazy band-aid for a bad prison system. NO.
10/31/2006:
The LA Times put up an article concerning the implementation of this law in Iowa and the result of the law? Not what they expected. I’m already opposed treating ex-convicts as second-class citizens (as I said, what’s the point of a penal system if you feel the need to continue penalizing people who go through it), but by implementing this law all you get are former sex offenders disappearing from radar. Now you can’t keep tabs period. I frankly don’t care, because I want to fix the problem, not the aftereffects of that problem. But for those who think voting yes on this will solve your problems, think again.
84 - Water Quality, Safety and Supply. Flood Control. Natural Resource Protection. Park Improvements.
We’re certainly doing our best as citizens to destroy this stuff, we might as well pay to fix it. YES.
85 - Waiting Period and Parental Notification Before Termination of Minor’s Pregnancy.
Emphatic NO. I will not have my state dictate family communication. I will not pass the buck of responsibility over the way a family interacts because some idiot (and in this case, one or two male idiots) feels a need to impose their religion and morality on a heterogeneous population. This is a revamped failed proposition from last year, which really pisses me off that it’s back on the ballot one year later. A few omitted words and it’s back? Yeah, how’d that happen. NO.
86 - Tax on Cigarettes
Sure, why not? That’s the quick reply. It’s not gonna affect me, I don’t smoke, so why not? Reading the actual proposition, I’m not sure I like it. I have no problem taxing substances. Hell, I’m all for legalizing other substances and taxing the crap out of them as well. This comes with too many strings. The tax should just go to the General Fund and be used where it is needed. NO.
87 - Alternative Energy. Research, Production, Incentives. Tax on California Oil Producers
This one proved an interesting online debate at the car forum… and quite a number of valid points were made, though none convinced me to vote either way. Now that I know much of the proceeds are targeted towards ethanol, and specifically towards the person who helped push this proposition into the ballot, Vinod Khosla, and there you have the tipping stone. I will not fund ethanol. Ethanol is stupid. It is a dead end. It means more homogenous corn crops that’ll end up doing more damage to the environment in the long run. NO.
88 - Education Funding. Real Property Parcel Tax
Proposition 13 has proven itself a disaster to state revenue (while providing cheap corporate land). I’m not going to repeat that mistake for my generation. Besides, I’m already YES on 1D. This one is NO.
89 - Political Campaigns. Public Financing. Corporate Tax Increase. Campaign Contribution and Expenditure Limits
I don’t mind using tax money to fund elections, removing the ability for corporations and small business to influence government. I prefer it. It’s our government and our election system… the argument about corporations needing a voice does not fly with me; the idea that a corporation can be treated as an individual when beneficial without repurcussions when, let’s face it, downright malicious, already pisses me off. YES.
90 - Government Acquisition, Regulation of Private Property
Whatever. Eminent domain in California can only occur to eliminate blight. Those arguments are derailing. I am not allowing property owners to use funny math to claim high prices for land that’s worthless. NO.
