A win for majority rule on local finances

[Zorro]

In California, it takes just a simple majority of voters to elect a mayor, a governor or even a member of Congress. But it requires a supermajority — two-thirds of the vote — to pass a local tax to fund a specific program, such as street repairs, parks or libraries. This disparity is due to Proposition 218, a 1996 ballot measure designed to make it harder for local governments to raise taxes, fees and assessments.

At least, it used to take a supermajority. On Aug. 28, the state Supreme Court struck a welcome blow to the unreasonably high vote thresholds in Proposition 218, upholding a lower court ruling that the proposition applies only to measures put on the ballot by elected government bodies, not to those sponsored by citizens. This is good news for communities that need to raise taxes for worthy projects, reaffirming the democratic principle that such decisions ought to reflect the will of the majority.

Proposition 218 — which, it must be pointed out, needed only a majority of votes to pass — subverted this principle by requiring cities, counties, school districts and other local governments to obtain the approval of two-thirds of the voters for most proposed tax increases. The sole exception was for taxes that go into a municipality’s general fund to support overall government operations, perhaps because general-purpose tax hikes are a tougher sell than those with a specific goal, such as building housing for the homeless or funding public transportation projects.

The restraints imposed by Proposition 218 reflected its supporters’ belief that local governments had overstepped in their desperation for revenue in the years after voters approved another anti-tax measure, Proposition 13. The lawsuit that led to the Supreme Court’s ruling last week, however, wasn’t primarily a fight over tax rates — it was a battle over whether a marijuana-related initiative could appear on a special-election ballot in Upland — and did not seek to upend the supermajority threshold. That was a happy accident.

http://www.latimes.com/opinion/editorials/la-ed-proposition-218-ruling-20170830-story.html

[JayhawkSD]

1. Actually, it favors "special interests" and millionaires.

The tax needed to build a football stadium for Alex Spanos would now only need 50% plus one vote to pass.

The measure would be a "citizens' initiative," since it would not be placed on the ballot by the government but would result from signatures gathered by workers who are paid anywhere from $5 to $25 for each signature they get. That payment is made by the owner of the football team who wants the city to build him a stadium so that his team can rake in millions for him at taxpayer expense.

Without the court ruling, the football team owner would have to get 66.67% of the public to vote to tax themselves to enrich him, but now his ability to feed from the public trough is made much easier. Three cheers.

So the court ruling was the result of "a battle over whether a marijuana-related initiative could appear on a special-election ballot in Upland," so pot smokers won a big battle and it's all good. Everyone should have access to cheap pot, and football stadiums.