There’s a tax storm afoot. According to Carl DeMaio at Reform California, “Counties, cities, and school districts have placed over 600 local measures on the November ballot statewide.”
And I’ll guess most are simple measures, since the governor and the legislature killed the Taxpayer Protection Act. But what? DeMaio says there’s new hope on the horizon – Prop 43, “Two-Thirds Vote Requirement for Local Special Tax Initiatives and Property Tax Initiative Prohibition Amendment”.
From Ballotpedia – A “yes” vote supports this amendment to require a two-thirds vote by the electorate to enact, extend, or increase local special tax initiatives and prohibit local jurisdictions and ballot initiatives from enacting ad valorem property taxes, except for voter-approved bond debt-service taxes authorized elsewhere in the state constitution.
The opposition is calling it “The Taxpayer Deception Act”. I never trust somebody when they start out taking a potshot at the opponent’s integrity, that is so cheap, it means they don’t have anything better. Their claim that the measure “LIMITS VOTERS RIGHTS, THREATENS LOCAL SERVICES” is a standard case of saying the direct opposite of the truth, and then repeating it until people believe it.
“Prop 43 makes it harder for you to fund critical services like police and fire departments, fix and repair local roads, staff our local schools or backfill federal healthcare cuts.”
First they threaten, then they attempt to shift the burden to the public, for public services. If we can’t get a cop when we need one, or our house burns down because of poor response times, if we have excessive tire damage and pedestrian deaths because of crappy roads, if our kids are behind in school – it’s because we don’t pay enough! They even threaten our healthcare, as if we had any.
Our city council, staffed by the unions, is telling us they must offer competitive salaries to recruit good employees – they keep telling us that, but we get fire fighters who demand to get paid to sleep, and cops who have inappropriate sexual relations on the clock. Just how much money does it take to get good people?
Of course those good people are taking the salaries we pay them to oppose a measure that protects our rights.
From the No on Prop 43 website – “Paid for by No on Prop 43: Stop the Local Taxpayer Deception Act, sponsored by labor organizations. Committee Top Funders: SEIU California State Council, California Professional Firefighters, NPH Action Fund”.
We need to get union influence out of our elections. This measure is a step in the right direction.
Chico Taxpayers Association 
Hi Juanita:
Another informative article! Prop 43 is great for slammed California taxpayers but it will be opposed by unions like the Chico Police Department union. Chico is NOT a city with a police department to run. The Chico PD has a city, Chico, to run as it sees fit.
Scott Rushing
No kidding Scott, we live in Union Town. And then Trump gives us “no taxes on overtime”- as if he’s talking about the guys and gals down at the plant!
None of our local legislators are sticking up for this bill, in fact, our city council actually moved to oppose the similar Taxpayer Protection Act (also for 2/3’s tax measures), and then Gov. Newsom and the legislature simply took it off the ballot.
We win a few, we lose a few, we can’t give up just because things don’t go our way all the time.
I think the wind is going to change in Chico this election. The incumbents have just screwed up so bad, we’re going to have one of those 180 degree pivots. We’ll see what the darling liberals will do about the cops. We’ll also look at the campaign reports and see who gets the most money from the unions, public safety and otherwise.