My thoughts on the California Ballot Initiatives
(9/30/20)
This would authorize $5.5 billion in state bonds for stem cell research. It is building on an earlier ballot initiative that raised $3 billion for stem cell research back in 2004. The funds have now been depleted. The measure would also expand the Board that distributes its funds.
It is supported by the sponsors (Ron Klein and the Institute for Regenerative Medicine) and by the California Democratic Party. The editorial boards of the San Jose Mercury News and Orange County Register oppose saying the state is in recession, and we ought not add more burdens to the state budget and the Bush Administration’s opposition to funding stem cell research is long ago and therefore this initiative is no longer needed.
In my opinion, this ought to go through the legislative process and be weighed against all the other proposed uses of state bonds.
Prop 15
This would repeal Prop 13 as applied to businesses and retain it for individual homeowners; this is known as the split roll.
Prop 13 of 1978 rolled back and froze local property taxes. They were capped at 1% of the purchase price and annual increases were limited to the inflation rate or 2%, whichever is less. It cut property tax revenues to public schools and cities and counties by close to 60%. It has created a highly unequal playing field among businesses with newcomers paying far higher property taxes than their competitors with long time presence in the state.
The increased revenues (estimated at $6.5 to $11 billion annually) would be allocated 60% to local governments and 40% to schools. Prop 15 exempts from taxation changes: residential properties; agricultural land; and owners of commercial and industrial properties with combined value of $3 million or less. The changes in assessed value would be phased in.
It is supported by the Governor, county and city governments and local school boards. It is opposed by the business community and the Howard Jarvis Taxpayer’s Association.
The best argument against it is made by Tom Campbell who says Prop 13 is key to attracting new businesses to California since it freezes future increases in their property taxes; however this misses the mark since it disadvantages them against any existing in-state competitors.
This is a hugely important initiative on the ballot, and I strongly recommend support for it.
Prop 16
Prop 16 repeals Prop 209 of 1996 and would thus allow for affirmative action in public schools and public employment on behalf of disadvantaged racial minorities and women.
It is supported by many Democratic elected officials and opposed by Ward Connerly, Darrell Issa and others who initially supported the passage of Prop 209.
At a time when our President is doing everything possible to encourage racial divisiveness in our nation; it is an appropriate time for California voters to embrace some help for those who have suffered from past race and sex discrimination affording them highly unequal educational opportunities, barriers to employment, segregated housing, and poor access to health care. See My Experiences with Racism at www.luciensblog.com
I’m voting a strong “yes”.
This would allow convicted felons to vote in California elections after they have completed their prison time, but while they are still serving parole. People released from prison on probation can vote in California, but people released from prison on parole cannot vote. Probation is imposed by the sentencing judge as a part of the original sentence; whereas parole is granted by the State Parole Board for good behavior and allows early release.
Nineteen other states allow felons on parole to vote. Three other states are like California. Three states including Kentucky prevent convicted felons from ever voting. The other states have a variety of restrictions.
The arguments for are the desire to rehabilitate and reintegrate prisoners once they are released from prison. The argument against is that the felons may have committed terrible crimes.
I’m a yes since if the Parole Board has decided on an early release for good behavior and their assessment of the convict’s reduced chances for recidivism, we should encourage the felon’s participation in the civil society.
Prop 18 (https://ballotpedia.org/California_Proposition_18,_Primary_Voting_for_17-Year-Olds_Amendment_(2020)
This would allow 17 year olds who will be eligible to vote in the November General election as an 18 year old to vote in the primaries and special elections earlier in the year.
Eighteen states already do this. The argument for is that it encourages civic engagement of new voters. The opponents argue the 17 year olds are not yet emancipated and subject to their parents and teachers’ indoctrination.
I’m a yes, as we need more civic engagement and improved political education of our young prospective voters.
This would allow people over 55, with severe disabilities, or victims of wildfires and other natural disasters to transfer their Prop 13 tax advantages when buying a new home of greater value anywhere in the state. This makes two changes: homes of greater value and anywhere in the state; existing law encourages downsizing and requires inter-county agreements because of the loss of important tax revenues to local governments.
It is supported by the California Association of Realtors and opposed by the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Assn. Their opposition is based on the measures’ repeal of earlier Prop 13 fixes. These fixes allowed parent to child and grandparents to grandchildren transfers of the property tax advantages of Prop 13.
It is also opposed by LA Times and San Jose Mercury News editorial boards who argued that Prop 13 was grossly inequitable to new homebuyers to begin with, and this makes it even more so.
I’m a no, for the reasons well expressed by the Times and Mercury News.
This initiative adds crimes to the list of violent felonies for which early parole is restricted; re-categorizes certain types of theft and fraud crimes as wobblers (chargeable as either misdemeanors or felonies); and requires DNA collection for certain misdemeanors.
The backdrop is mass incarceration and the backlash. California like many other states began incarcerating lots of people (mostly black and brown) back in the 80’s. This resulted in dangerous and severe prison overcrowding, lots of new prisons being built and a very fast growing % of the state budget devoted to prisons. After the courts told California its prison overcrowding and dangerously deficient medical care violated the 8th Amendment protections against cruel and unusual punishment, California has chosen to enact criminal justice reforms that reduced its state prison population by about a third – from 480 per 100,000 population to 320 per 100,000 population.
Prop 20 was drafted and is strongly supported by the Prison Guard’s union and some police officers and deputy sheriffs associations and crime victim advocates. It is opposed by ex-Governor Jerry Brown, some elected DA’s, the unions, the League of Women Voters and other crime victim advocates.
The SF Chronicle, Bakersfield Californian and OC Register have editorially criticized it for three reasons: bad policy, expensive and drafted by the Prison Guards, and should go through the legislative process rather than the initiative where the good and bad aspects can be sorted through by our elected representatives. I agree and am voting no.
Prop 21 https://ballotpedia.org/California_Proposition_21,_Local_Rent_Control_Initiative_(2020)
California has the second highest rents in the nation, and in many of our largest cities, 60% of renters are paying too much (i.e. more than 30%) of their incomes towards their rents. California has not built enough housing, and thus rents are too high, too unaffordable and too many Californians are homeless. In the midst of our pandemic and economic meltdown with record unemployment, property values are skyrocketing, as are the numbers of homeless in our state.
Prop 21 is a proposal to allow cities and other local governments to expand rent control. Amends state law to allow local governments to establish rent control on residential properties over 15 years old. Allows local limits on annual rent increases to differ from current statewide limit. Allows rent increases in rent-controlled properties of up to 15 percent over three years at start of new tenancy (above any increase allowed by local ordinance). Exempts individuals who own no more than two homes from new rent-control policies. In accordance with California law, it prohibits rent control from violating landlords’ right to fair financial return.
Costa Hawkins Act of 1995 provided that: Cities cannot enact rent control on housing first occupied after February 1, 1995, and housing units where the title is separate from connected units (such as free-standing houses, condominiums, and townhouses). Housing exempted from a local rent control ordinance before February 1, 1995, must remain exempt. Landlords have a right to increase rent prices to market rates when a tenant moves out (a policy known as vacancy decontrol).
In 2019, the California State Legislature passed AB 1482, to cap annual rent increases at 5 percent plus inflation for tenants. AB 1482 also required that a landlord have a just cause, as defined in the law, to evict tenants that had occupied the rental for at least one year. AB 1482 included exemptions for housing built in the past 15 years and some single-family homes and duplexes. The legislation was designed to sunset after 10 years.
This ballot measure was conceived and supported by Michael Weinstein of the LA AIDS Health Care Foundation; it is supported by the California Nurses, SEIU, and AFCSME. It is opposed by Governor Newsom, the real estate industry, the construction unions and many advocates like Seniors, Veterans, and the state NAACP. The LA Times endorsed it as a stop gap to protect tenants from affordable rent increases and evictions, while all the other major newspapers opposed it, saying the solution is build more, new and affordable housing and expanded rent controls would discourage that.
I’m leaning no, but persuadable. I’m not sure it has major improvements beyond those already passed in AB 1482 that warrant an initiative.
This initiative classifies Lyft, Uber, DoorDash, Instacart and Postmates drivers as “independent contractors” as opposed to “employees”. The effect is to deny them all the benefits associated with employment -- such as minimum wage, worker’s comp, 8 hour work day, overtime pay, health insurance, and unemployment insurance.
In the background are the phenomenal growth in gig employment (i.e. no benefits and no labor law protections) and the court decisions and legislative actions surrounding them. The California Supreme Court reiterated the traditional three part test of employment vs. independent contractors in Dynamax and the state legislature codified it in AB 5 of 2019: (A) The person is free from the control and direction of the hiring entity in connection with the performance of the work, both under the contract for the performance of the work and in fact. (B) The person performs work that is outside the usual course of the hiring entity’s business. (C) The person is customarily engaged in an independently established trade, occupation, or business of the same nature as that involved in the work performed.
This initiative tries to carve out their drivers as independent contractors and offer the following benefits in lieu of the state and federal labor law protections afforded employees: payments for the difference between a worker's net earnings, excluding tips, and a net earnings floor based on 120% of the minimum wage applied to a driver's engaged time and 30 cents, adjusted for inflation after 2021, per engaged mile; limiting app-based drivers from working more than 12 hours during a 24-hour period, unless the driver has been logged off for an uninterrupted 6 hours; for drivers who average at least 25 hours per week of engaged time during a calendar quarter, require companies to provide healthcare subsidies equal to 82% the average Covered California (CC) premium for each month; for drivers who average between 15 and 25 hours per week of engaged time during a calendar quarter, require companies to provide healthcare subsidies equal to 41% the average CC premium for each month; require companies to provide or make available occupational accident insurance to cover at least $1 million in medical expenses and lost income resulting from injuries suffered while a driver was online (defined as when the driver is using the app and can receive service requests) but not engaged in personal activities; require the occupational accident insurance to provide disability payments of 66 percent of a driver's average weekly earnings during the previous four weeks before the injuries suffered (while the driver was online but not engaged in personal activities) for upwards of 104 weeks (about 2 years); and require companies to provide or make available accidental death insurance for the benefit of a driver's spouse, children, or other dependents when the driver dies while using the app. Proposition 22 would define a driver's engaged time as the time between accepting a service request and completing the request. It’s an interesting array of benefits, but it’s unclear whether this is such a great model that we should scrap existing labor law protections for these workers.
The initiative proponents have raised a huge war chest and are supported by the business community; they threaten to leave the state if they don’t get their way. The opponents are the labor unions and elected Democratic officials.
I’m a strong no on this. In my life, I have been a cab driver, a consultant, an employee and a small business owner. The labor laws are in place to provide a minimum economic floor and safety net for employees while the business model of Uber and its competitors is to bypass that minimum floor with insufficient protections for their workers.
Just think about all the Unemployment Insurance claims and the health insurance costs for laid off workers associated with the severe and ongoing Covid 19 recession, do you want the drivers (if they are re-classified as consultants by this initiative) or do you want these immensely profitable businesses and their customers to shoulder them?
Prop 23: https://ballotpedia.org/California_Proposition_23,_Dialysis_Clinic_Requirements_Initiative_(2020)
This ballot initiative requires chronic dialysis clinics to: have an on-site physician while patients are being treated; report data on dialysis-related infections; obtain consent from the state health department before closing a clinic; and not discriminate against patients based on the source of payment for care.
It is part of a dispute between union organizers (UHW-West) and the highly profitable dialysis industry.
These disputes ought to be resolved in the state legislature, not through ballot initiatives. I’m voting no.
This initiative expands the state’s consumer data privacy laws, including provisions to allow consumers to direct businesses to not share their personal information; remove the time period in which businesses can fix violations before being penalized; and create the Privacy Protection Agency to enforce the state’s consumer data privacy laws.
The Electronic Frontiers Foundation neither supports nor opposes it, saying it takes steps both forward and backwards from California’s excellent existing privacy protections. https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2020/07/why-eff-doesnt-support-cal-prop-24
Andrew Yang, Consumer Watchdog, Senator Ben Allen and Rep. Ro Khanna encourage a yes vote, while the California Nurses, AARP, ACLU and League of Women Voters urge a no vote.
The LA Times urges a yes (saying it improves existing law and creates an important new state agency to protect consumer privacy), and the San Jose Mercury News urges a no (saying let the Legislature tailor the fixes).
I’m leaning yes, but persuadable.
This is the bail bond industry’s effort to overturn state legislation (SB 10 or 2019) replacing cash bail with risk assessments. It’s a referendum, rather than an initiative.
Under SB 10, defendants are classified as low risk, medium risk or high risk based on the judge’s assessment of whether they will show for trial and/or commit another crime in the interim. High-risk defendants are kept in custody ‘til trial, and low risk defendants are typically released. Medium risk defendants’ pre-trial custody is determined by local court rules. This replaces cash bail under which most low-income defendants were kept in jail pending trial with disastrous consequences for their jobs and families while high-income defendants could typically purchase their pre-trial release from jail with cash bail.
The supporters of the “no” vote are the bail bondspersons and their business allies. The newspaper editorials from Orange and Bakersfield to San Francisco and San Jose are all urging a “yes” vote.
I’m a strong “yes”. This was a very important reform for low-income and moderate- income defendants facing unproven criminal charges.
Prepared by: Lucien Wulsin
Dated: 9/30/20