Ballot Measures

Joe Mathews is right: the way California lets politicians, whether the attorney general or the Legislature, put their thumbs on the scale by writing cagey or misleading titles and summaries for ballot measures invites dishonesty and abuse, as with Proposition 1A on the May special election ballot.The state needs an independent ballot title process carried out, as he says, by non-politicians.

Here’s how it might work:

When a measure for the ballot is submitted to the state, the secretary of state would ask the Legislative Analyst’s Office (LAO) to prepare a list of up to ten multiple-choice questions about its major provisions and effects.

She would then send a staff member to a randomly selected place in the state. The staffer would offer $1,000 apiece to the first three registered voters he meets on the street if they would agree to sit together and write the title and summary of the measure. They would have one hour to read the measure and write a title and summary. All three would have to agree on the wording. If they could not perform that task by consensus, the measure would be returned to the proponent for rewriting.

When read the ballot description of the six measures that were put on the May 19 special election ballot as part of February's budget deal, California voters in a new Field Poll gave majority support to five of the six. But that support was soft. A sixth measure -- which involves borrowing against future lottery revenues -- trails, and may be essentially a dead letter as a result.

The poll is here. One big reason for skepticism about the prospects of any of the measures (with the exception of the sixth, a populist blast that would bar legislative pay raises during years when there's a deficit) is that solid majorities of voters are dissatisfied with the budget deal. And these measures were part of the budget deal. Also, Gov. Schwarzenegger, the politician who is most invested in the passage of these measures, is decidedly unpopular, with an approval rating below 40 percent. 

I'm thinking of suing the state for legislative pay. As a voter. To secure the vote of Republican state senator Abel Maldonado, a holdout whose vote is needed to pass a massive budget compromise bill in California, Democrats are considering Maldonado's demand for three ballot measures, the Sacramento Bee reports. The measures would create an open, or "top two" primary for the state, prohibit legislative pay raises if the budget is in deficit, and prevent lawmakers from receiving salaries if the budget is not passed on time.

Those three measures would be on top of the five other ballot measures required by other aspects of the deal. In all, Californians would have to vote on eight measures that are part of a mega-compromise. None of the measures are simple. They include changes to the state's education funding formula, the reversal of previous ballot initiatives on early childhood education and mental health, a new spending cap for the state, and a plan to borrow against future lottery revenues.

The state legislature has yet to announce a date for a special election to consider budget measures. Expect to vote during graduation season--sometime between mid-May and early June. Since we don't know the full details of a budget deal, or whether the current tentative deal will hold, we can't say for sure what else will be on the ballot. But the LA Times opinion blog recently had a description of what was already headed for the ballot, pre-budget deal.

Want more proof that the initiative process is too powerful in California? All the recent talk about lawmakers reaching a budget deal is bunk. The deal, even if it passes, requires the voters to sign off on multiple ballot measures later this year. That's right -- California simply can't handle a budget emergency without a vote of the people.

Details have not been released, but I count at least five separate ballot measures that would be needed to complete this deal: 1. a measure authorizing the modernizing of the lottery and borrowing against future funds. 2. the approval of some sort of new spending limit that Republicans insisted upon in negotiations. 3. Changes to the state's education funding formula. 4. A measure permitting the state to raid money that voters approved for early childhood programs and 5. A measure permitting the state to raid money that voters approved for mental health programs.

Given the extreme costs of delays by the legislature, and their inability to do much without the voters OK, the real question is: why bother having a legislature at all?

Not the 21st century, mind you. But South Dakota, where American direct democracy began in 1898, is considering whether to change its woefully outdated laws that permit initiative sponsors to write their own descriptions of what their measure would do. In the world outside South Dakota, titles and summaries have been written by public officials who are supposed to be neutral. (In California, it's the attorney general). More details of the proposal from this story in the Mitchell Republic.

Paul Jacob, the term limits advocate, emails and says that Citizens In Charge, his organization to advocate for the initiative process and the rights of people to petition their government, is growing. A year in, the group -- which is really two groups (one a 501 c 3, the other a different kind of non-profit, a c4) -- has six employees and is working on several fronts, including making it easier to qualify measures for the ballot in Oklahoma. If he's successful in opening up the process in Oklahoma (where the attorney general unsuccessfully attempted to prosecute Jacob for ballot initiative work), it would be especially sweet. The state is probably the hardest place in America to qualify an initiative, because of government hostility and a tight, 90-day time limit on signature gathering.

This week in New Orleans, an obscure self-regulating board called the Municipal Securities Rulemaking Board (it's made up mostly of bond industry pros, but was created by Congress and is overseen by the SEC) is meeting to discuss how to deal with a persistent problem in state and local bond measures. Bond underwriters across the country (and particularly in California) often contribute to the political committees that support the campaigns for bond measures. When the measure passes, the bond underwriters who make contributions often end up handling the bond work.

There's growing concern about this sort of "pay to play"  among big underwriters such as Citi, JP Morgan and Morgan Stanley. Already, underwriters are barred from giving to public officials who oversee bond issues. The proposal being discussed that week would extend the ban to donations to ballot measure committees. More details via The Bond Buyer.  This seems wise. It's crucial that the ban have no loopholes. It should cover any firm or lender of any kind who might be involved in the bond business.

A Utah lawmaker has introduced a bill to reduce the length of ballot measure titles from 100 words -- too lengthy apparently for voters in Utah -- to 75 words. 100 words isn't much in an era when complex ballot initiatives often exceed 5,000 words. This story suggests that state and local governments also might save money on printing costs with fewer words.

Macleans offers its own look at the results of major American ballot measures this fall.