Debra Bowen

California Secretary of State Debra Bowen appears to have run out of patience with the legislature and the governor, and who can blame her? They have talked of adding measures to the November ballot as part of a budget deal, but there's been no deal and they've ignored all deadlines. The governor and lawmakers seemed to believe that they could simply waive the deadlines in the law and regulations.

This afternoon, Bowen's office issued a statement in which she closed the door on waiving deadlines to add measures. "We are at the point where that is unacceptable," she said in the statement. She has advised county election officials to move forward with their November general election preparations without the governor and the legislature. Bowen's making the right call--it's essential to get the November ballots right, and that takes time. But it also deepens the state's budget stalemate. The goal of getting measures on the November ballot offered one of the few time pressures that seemed to mean anything to our procrastinating elected leaders. Now, that bit of time pressure is gone. If there are going to be ballot measures as part of any compromise, they would appear on a special election ballot in 2009, if the governor chose to call one, or on the next scheduled statewide ballot, the June 2010 primary.

That's today's California quote of the day from Democratic spinner extraordinaire Steve Maviglio. He's talking about Monday's supposed 5 p.m. deadline to remove a high-speed rail bond measure from the November ballot and replace it with a more carefully drafted bond on the same subject. The legislature, which is facing Gov. Schwarzenegger's threat to veto every bill that reaches his desk until there's a budget deal, failed to pull the switcheroo yesterday. But there may still be more time. Secretary of State Debra Bowen has set Saturday as a deadline for adding measures, but the problem in this case is that the measure being removed is scheduled to be in the voter guide. There is no precedent for removing a measure from the ballot that's already appeared in the guide sent to voters.