tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1672373860834375862024-03-21T17:26:04.055-07:00SF ReasonPolitical musings from reasonable peopleBrendanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15810877387574644692noreply@blogger.comBlogger18125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-167237386083437586.post-49472924680390257792022-11-06T21:02:00.000-08:002022-11-06T21:02:02.115-08:00November 2022 Endorsements<p><b>Prop 1</b> – Right to abortion, contraceptives – <b>Yes</b></p><p>In the recent <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dobbs_v._Jackson_Women%27s_Health_Organization">Dobbs decision</a>, the US Supreme Court decided the United States Constitution does not confer a right to abortion, overturning the 1973 <i>Roe v. Wade</i> case. The decision itself does not restrict abortion, but it does open the door for states to do so.</p><p>Abortion is legal by default, and California law already reaffirms its legality in the state. There is no serious threat to the status quo here, so Prop 1 is mainly symbolic, some might say a waste of time and money. Fine, but we’ve gotten to this point, so we’ll just vote yes.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>Prop 26</b> – Expand Indian gaming – <b>Split</b></p><p>Legal gambling in California currently consists of tribal casinos, card rooms, horse racing tracks, oh, and the California Lottery. In each case, the type of gambling allowed at a venue is restricted. For example, Indian casinos can only offer slot machines, lottery games, and certain card games.</p><p>Prop 26 would allow tribal casinos to offer roulette and dice games. It would also allow in-person sports betting at Indian casinos and horse racing tracks.</p><p>We were split on this one. Some of us argued that gambling is an addictive, anti-social behavior that should not be expanded. Others didn’t see how offering a few more games would make a material difference, or why we should regulate supposedly sovereign Indian tribes in this way. Mostly we don’t care and wish we weren’t asked to make this decision.</p><p>Card rooms are opposed to Prop 26, maybe because it would make them less competitive with Indian casinos, but also because a provision in Prop 26 allows gaming laws to be enforced via lawsuits filed by any individual or organization. Race tracks are <i>really</i> in favor of (and spending a lot of money on) Prop 26, hoping to inject life into a faltering business model that has come under increased <a href="https://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/3-horses-die-at-Golden-Gate-Fields-17213314.php">scrutiny</a> in recent years.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>Prop 27</b> – Online sports betting – <b>No</b></p><p>Online sports betting is currently illegal in California. If you <a href="https://sportsbook.draftkings.com/ca-sports-betting">sign in</a> to Draft Kings from here, you will not be able to bet any actual money on the site. Prop 27 would allow Draft Kings and others to serve California residents after paying a $100 million licensing fee and partnering with a gaming tribe. The tax revenue, perhaps $500 million annually, would be earmarked for homelessness programs, gambling addiction programs, and tribal economic development.</p><p>Some of us generally oppose any expansion of gambling. We’re against most earmarks as well. But we’re especially against out-of-state companies spending lavishly to manipulate our state laws for their own obvious benefit. If this had come from the people or the legislature maybe we’d feel differently.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>Prop 28</b> - Arts and music education earmarks - <b>No</b></p><p>Let’s get this out of the way: we like arts and music education! But one thing we’ve been consistent about is we don’t like earmarks. We think the elected, professional legislators should figure out the best way to spend California’s budget, not the general population, manipulated by ads and without the time to understand the complexities of running a state the size of California.</p><p>Prop 28 is an earmark on top of an earmark: <a href="https://ballotpedia.org/California_Proposition_98,_Mandatory_Education_Spending_Initiative_(1988)">1988’s Prop 98</a> mandates that about 40% of California’s budget has to be spent on education. We probably would have voted against it if we hadn’t still been in grade school, even though we really like education and think money should be spent on it. Prop 28 earmarks more education money, specifically for arts and music. We’re voting against it for the same reason.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>Prop 29</b> – Dialysis clinics regulation – <b>No</b></p><p>Does this sound familiar? We’ve already been asked to vote on this twice before: <a href="https://sf-reason.blogspot.com/2018/10/november-2018-endorsements.html">Prop 8 in 2018</a> and <a href="https://sf-reason.blogspot.com/2020/10/november-2020-endorsements.html">Prop 23 in 2020</a>. On the surface it seems like a reasonable regulation for kidney dialysis clinics: require a physician assistant or higher-qualified medical professional to be on site. But behind the scenes it’s really an attempt by the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) to hurt, even close non-union dialysis clinics, with patients/customers as collateral damage.</p><p>There may be legitimate gripes about dialysis clinics, but patients continue to choose them for the procedure, perhaps because convenience is a big factor when you have to go in three times per week. We think patients should be allowed to make that choice.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>Prop 30</b> – Environment tax on the rich – <b>No</b></p><p>We do like the environment and we do like taxing rich people (in this case people making over $2 million per year), but we don’t like earmarks put in place by initiatives. At least this one creates a new revenue source rather than taking a piece out of the existing budget. But still, we think the legislature should perhaps do this, not the voters directly.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>Prop 31</b> – Flavored tobacco ban – <b>Yes</b></p><p>Here’s one of those initiatives that ratifies a law already passed by the legislature. So our standard call to “let the legislators legislate” would default us to a yes. In this case the law is to ban the sale of flavored tobacco products in the state.</p><p>We did have a conversation about the merits of such a ban. There are the standard calls to save the children from the addictive habit, basically coming to the conclusion that if people (even adults) want to use tobacco products, they should have to endure them in an unappealing form. The question was asked: would you also want to ban the sale of sugary alcoholic drinks like Mike’s Hard Lemonade? To the credit of one participant, he was consistent and said yes he would…and sorority girls everywhere cried out.</p><p> </p>Brendanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15810877387574644692noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-167237386083437586.post-90581388103565878172020-10-20T12:44:00.020-07:002020-11-04T11:18:05.629-08:00November 2020 Endorsements<p><b>Prop 14</b> - Stem cell research funding - <b>No</b></p><p><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2004_California_Proposition_71">2004's Proposition 71</a> established a fund to support stem cell research in California using $3 billion in bonds. This year's Prop 14 seeks to extend the program with $5.5 billion in additional bonds.</p><p>The original initiative was passed a few years before we started this group, but I have a feeling we would have voted for it. It was starting new research programs which involved new construction and the creation of new infrastructure. And Prop 71 was in response to the Bush administration's refusal to support stem cell research on religious grounds, even though many felt it held great potential. It was an unusual move, as scientific research funding is usually the domain of the federal government, not individual states.</p><p>We still like stem cell research and are fine with the program continuing, but see no reason it should be done with <a href="http://sf-reason.blogspot.com/2018/10/our-feelings-about-bonds.html">bonds</a>. In fact, the money from Prop 71 has still not been fully spent and the organization that controls the fund, the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine, still has 35 full-time employees. Even more unusual, Prop 14 spreads the bond purchases over 11 years, acquiring $540 million in debt per year. So why is this using bonds again? Just put $540 million directly into the program and skip the bond process.</p><p>Aside from the bonds issue, these initiatives tie the hands of legislators, forcing them to spend money a certain way and we are generally against that, especially when a certain virus is wrecking havoc with our economy and tax revenues are way down. A few of us like stem cells enough that we want to force the hands of legislators and secure the funding, but most of us were unwilling.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>Prop 15</b> - Repeal Prop 13 for commercial real estate - <b>Yes</b></p><p>To be frank, our group despises <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1978_California_Proposition_13">1978's Proposition 13,</a> the notorious initiative that fixed property taxes to the most recent accessed value, which in many cases was determined decades ago when the property was last sold. It probably sounded good at the time, the idea of not "taxing people out of their homes," but the unintended consequences have been huge. More on that later.</p><p>Prop 15 undoes the initiative-that-shall-not-be-named for commercial property, which would hereafter be taxed at its current market value. It makes an exception when someone owns less than $3 million in commercial property, which would probably be a typical storefront.</p><p>Sounds good to us. Someday we hope to repeal the rest.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>Prop 16</b> - Allow affirmative action again - <b>Yes</b></p><p><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1996_California_Proposition_209">1996's Prop 209</a> effectively banned affirmative action from state-run entities. It reads, <i>"The state shall not discriminate against, or grant preferential treatment to, any individual or group on the basis of race, sex, color, ethnicity, or national origin in the operation of public employment, public education, or public contracting."</i></p><p>Prop 209 was controversial in its time, but it has resisted attempts to repeal it until the recent <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Floyd_protests">Black Lives Matter protests</a> brought the issue to the forefront again. Prop 16 will simply remove the text Prop 209 added to the California constitution.</p><p>The various <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Affirmative_action_in_the_United_States#Arguments_in_favor_of_affirmative_action">pros and cons</a> of affirmative action have been discussed widely in America for years, so there's little need to repeat them here. With one exception, our group was all in favor of bringing it back.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>Prop 17</b> - Allow parolees to vote - <b>Yes</b></p><p>California currently restores the right to vote to those sentenced to time state prison after they have completed their full prison terms. Many prisoners are released early on parole, but they are still not eligible to vote until their parole is over.</p><p>Prop 17 would allow parolees to vote. We already think prison sentences are a bit too long, so we're in favor of this gesture to speed their path back to full citizenship.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>Prop 18</b> - Primary voting for 17-year-olds - <b>Yes</b></p><p>Prop 18 allows 17-year-olds to vote in the primary election if they will be 18 by the date of the general election.</p><p>A few of us were against Prop 18 for a variety of reasons. Primaries are really about the party, so why should an innocent babe have a say in it? Or since there's always going to be those who fall short of any cutoff we set, what's the point of setting the cutoff a few months earlier? Or why are we being asked to vote on something like this?</p><p>But the majority were in favor.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>Prop 19</b> - Slight Prop 13 loosening for residential real estate - <b>Yes</b></p><p>And we're back to <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1978_California_Proposition_13">Prop 13</a>, which significantly deprives school districts of tax revenue, but at least that was an intended consequence. The unintended consequence of Prop 13 is that it has severely distorted the housing market by flipping the incentive structure. As an area (perhaps the Bay Area) draws more people, current residents are incentivized to stay in their current homes and prevent new houses from being built, pushing housing prices for new arrivals into the stratosphere. We wish this were about repealing Prop 13, but it's not.</p><p>Under Prop 13, homeowners can move to another property in the same county at the same price and keep their sweet tax deal. Prop 19 loosens the rules a bit, letting people buy more expensive houses in other counties, and they will pay taxes on the price difference. This may encourage some people to move out of the more high-demand areas, making room for new people who will pay a normal amount of taxes. Good.</p><p>Under the current law, the children of someone with the sweet tax deal get to inherit the deal along with the house, so the property taxes don't go up even after death of the owner, even if the next generation is renting it out as an investment property (so not being "taxed out of their home"). Under Prop 19, the inheritor has to live in the house to keep the deal, so that's something.</p><p>So we're all for Prop 19, but hope to someday do much more to dismantle Prop 13.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>Prop 20</b> - Tough on crime - <b>No</b></p><p>Prop 20 will reduce the number of crimes eligible for parole, re-classify many crimes from misdemeanors to felonies, and require the collection of DNA samples for certain misdemeanors.</p><p>Prop 20 feels like something straight out of the 1990s "Tough on Crime" era. It rolls back earlier initiatives we supported that lowered sentences (2014's Prop 47) and allowed parole for non-violent offenders (2016's Prop 57). Did a Texas ballot initiative get printed on the California ballot by mistake?</p><p>So no.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>Prop 21</b> - Rent control expansion - <b>Yes</b></p><p>The Costa-Hawkins Rental Housing Act of 1995 is a statewide law prohibiting rent control on any property completed after February 1, 1995. Prop 10 from 2018 would have allowed cities to put rent control back if they chose to, but it failed. But then the legislature passed <a href="https://www.sfgate.com/news/bayarea/article/Gov-Newsom-Signs-Tough-Renter-Protection-Bill-14502375.php">AB 1482</a>, which caps rent raises to 5% plus inflation for apartment buildings over 15 years old, so now some form of rent control is widespread throughout California.</p><p>Prop 21 would expand on that a bit, allowing a city to limit rent increases even more. Cities could also prevent a landlord from raising the price of a unit when it changes hands, limiting them to 15% per year for three years after the new tenant moves in.</p><p>While one member of our group pointed out that <a href="https://freakonomics.com/podcast/rent-control/">economists universally loathe rent control</a>, saying it actually hurts the people it claims to help, the rest of us think there are legitimate reasons for a city to have rent control. Unlike AB 1482, Prop 21 only gives a city permission to implement rent control, it does not force it upon them.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>Prop 22</b> - Keep Uber and Lyft drivers independent contractors - <b>No</b></p><p>The 2018 <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dynamex_Operations_West,_Inc._v._Superior_Court">Dynamex</a> decision by the California Supreme Court set up the "ABC Test" to determine if a worker could be classified as an independent contractor instead of an employee. It was codified into law with <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_Assembly_Bill_5_(2019)">AB 5</a>, and then amended to exempt a number of different professions in <a href="https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billTextClient.xhtml?bill_id=201920200AB2257">AB 2257</a>. One of the professions specifically <i>not</i> exempted were drivers for app-based services like Uber and Lyft, who then crafted Prop 22.</p><p>An Uber driver reclassified as an employee would enjoy the benefits of guaranteed minimum wage, worker's comp, health care, and standard work schedule, etc. Payroll taxes would also be collected for each employee. On one hand, some drivers say they enjoy the flexibility being an occasional independent contractor provides. On the other hand, 70% of them work 30 hours or more per week.</p><p>Some members of our group thought such a change would drastically affect the Uber and Lyft service and/or price. (The companies were threatening to abandon the California market until a <a href="https://www.wired.com/story/uber-lyft-win-reprive-wont-quit-california-now/">temporary reprieve</a> from AB 5 was granted.) Other group members thought the changes would be minor, but the worker benefits would be huge. Still others thought rather than speculate about what the consequences would be, AB 5 should be tried and later altered by the legislature if need be—voting this in as an initiative means only another initiative can undo it.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>Prop 23</b> - Dialysis clinic regulations - <b>Split</b></p><p>Approximately 80,000 patients in California with kidney disease get treated three times per week at a chronic dialysis clinic, as opposed to a hospital. The clinics are generally for-profit companies who charge more than the hospital, but the majority of patients make a plan with their doctor to use a clinic, perhaps because they are more convenient.</p><p>Dialysis clinics are already regulated by the California Department of Public Health, but Prop 23 would add some additional regulations, such as requiring them to have a doctor present at all times. The regulations would make running the clinics more expensive.</p><p>Prop 23 is in some ways similar to 2018's Prop 8, and is backed by the same organization, the Service Employees International Union (SEIU). In both cases, their motivation appears to be to punishing or eliminating dialysis clinics, whose workers are not unionized. They want patients go to union-run hospitals.</p><p>In 2018 our members rejected Prop 8, not wanting to get involved with a union dispute, even if there may be good reasons to <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yw_nqzVfxFQ">dislike</a> the clinics. This time we were evenly split, so we have no endorsement.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>Prop 24</b> - Consumer privacy laws - <b>No</b></p><p>California already has various rules around the treatment of your personal information, but Prop 24 would alter them. <a href="https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2020/07/why-eff-doesnt-support-cal-prop-24">According to the Electronic Frontier Foundation</a>, the new regulations are neither stronger nor weaker than what currently exists, just…different.</p><p>So maybe it would be a toss-up to support Prop 24, except by setting the law in place with an initiative, only another initiative could repeal it. Digital privacy is a relatively new legal area, constantly changing. We don't think it would be wise to set anything in stone instead of having the legislature continue to mold the laws as needed.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>Prop 25</b> - Ending cash bail - <b>Yes</b></p><p>The California State Senate passed a bill to end cash bail, <a href="https://www.courts.ca.gov/pretrial.htm">SB 10</a>, in August 2018. But the California constitution allows the public to subject any law to a public referendum, so here we are. Apparently the bail bonds industry led the charge, seeing as their industry was on the verge of becoming obsolete.</p><p>We don't like the idea of one's bank balance determining whether or not they will remain free until trial, so we are fans of SB 10. Also not really fans of the bail bonds industry.</p><p>Some say the algorithm used to determine if someone can go free is racially biased, but we think that particular injustice can be fixed as we end the bigger injustice of cash bail.</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><b>Results</b></p><p>Prop 14 - Yes<br>Prop 15 - No<br>Prop 16 - No<br>Prop 17 - Yes<br>Prop 18 - No<br>Prop 19 - Yes<br>Prop 20 - No<br>Prop 21 - No<br>Prop 22 - Yes<br>Prop 23 - No<br>Prop 24 - Yes<br>Prop 25 - No</p>Brendanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15810877387574644692noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-167237386083437586.post-47995355809240923082018-10-26T08:52:00.007-07:002018-11-07T11:29:38.389-08:00November 2018 Endorsements<b>Prop 1</b> - Bonds for low-income housing - <b>No</b><br />
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We were really torn about this one. On one hand it wants to do a lot of very good things, many of which involve building, which makes it seem like a good <a href="http://sf-reason.blogspot.com/2018/10/our-feelings-about-bonds.html" target="_blank">use of bonds</a>. But then again this is the kind of building that should be ongoing, in the budget every year. In fact, it used to be in the budget every years as a duty of the California Redevelopment Agency.<br />
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Oh, but there are things to like about Prop 1. It helps veterans get loans to buy houses, which they will pay back with some interest. It lets local governments set their definition of what constitutes low-income housing. It encourages building near public transit. And it tries to make the whole housing market more affordable the only way that could actually work: by increasing the supply.<br />
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Crap, so much to like, but there’s this whole <a href="http://sf-reason.blogspot.com/2018/10/our-feelings-about-bonds.html" target="_blank">bond</a> thing. Our group voted narrowly against, but can understand if you want to vote for this. Heck, Californians seem to vote in favor of all other bonds, Prop 1 will probably be no different.<br />
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<b>Prop 2</b> - Build housing for mental health services - <b>Yes</b><br />
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This would authorize the use of money from the Mental Health Services Act of 2004 to be used to build housing for its patients. The Legislature created the No Place Like Home program in 2016 to do this, but the courts are trying to decide if housing is a legal use of the Mental Health Services Act money. Passing Prop 2 would send it straight through.<br />
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The housing would be built with $2 billion in bonds, payments coming from Mental Health Services Act revenues, which we hear are underutilized anyway. We think this is a reasonable (if not perfect) use of bonds. We think that housing a mentally ill person or someone teetering toward the abyss can be a great tool toward stabilizing them, so we are in favor.<br />
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<b>Prop 3 </b>- Water bond - <b>No</b><br />
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Hey look at that, another water bond, strikingly similar the the one voters passed (of course) just f<a href="http://sf-reason.blogspot.com/2018/06/june-2018-endorsements.html" target="_blank">ive months ago</a>, or the other one they passed <a href="http://sf-reason.blogspot.com/2014/10/november-2014-endorsements.html" target="_blank">four years ago</a>. We were against the recent one for our standard bond reasons, so naturally we’re against this one as well. I mean, come on, how many water bonds do you really need before it becomes obvious this should be in the regular budget?<br />
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Supposedly this is a “pay-to-play” bond, where the backers are the various contractors who would get paid to build this projects. Some of the money would go to projects on private land. No, no, no.<br />
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<b>Prop 4</b> - Children’s hospitals bond - <b>No</b><br />
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OK, here’s where our <a href="http://sf-reason.blogspot.com/2018/10/our-feelings-about-bonds.html" target="_blank">bond stance</a> is really going to make us look heartless. In a way, an argument against this $1.5 billion bond is that it’s too <i>low</i>. The bond payments would be $80 million per year, while this year California had a budget of $201 billion. And a lot of the money in this thing would go toward maintenance…of private hospitals…whose CEOs make over $1 million per year. These private non-profit hospitals are typically supported by charity, and we think that’s a good model. One of us didn’t have the heart to turn the children down, but the rest of us kept a stiff upper lip.<br />
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<b>Prop 5</b> - Property tax transfer requirements - <b>No</b><br />
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Prop 13 in 1978 limited the amount by which property taxes could increase if the owner didn’t move or perform any major construction. The result is that in a neighborhood where market values have greatly increased over time, newer home owners will pay much more property tax than the old-timers. This prevents longtime residents from getting taxed out of their homes (so they often will never move), but it also means substantially less taxes are collected. Property taxes are the bedrock of public school funding. We have mostly negative feelings about Prop 13.<br />
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Prop 13 does allow for someone to move once and keep their low tax if they move within the same county to a home of equal or lesser value. Prop 5 would get rid of those limitations, letting anyone over 55 move anywhere in the state to a home of any value, and still pay the same property tax.<br />
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This sounds like a bad idea to us. If someone can afford to buy a more expensive home, they can afford to pay taxes. If Prop 5 only got rid of the requirement that the homeowner stay in the same county, we would be in favor of it in order to free up space in high-demand areas. But if you’re upgrading to a bigger home, you should be ready to pay some bigger taxes.<br />
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On the other hand, we’re caught in a game of chicken, a big unintended consequence of Prop 13. Homeowners in a high-demand area may want to move, but don’t want to lose their great tax deal. We want them to move but aren’t willing to let them transfer it. By sticking to our guns, maybe we’re just hurting ourselves and not freeing up any of that housing. Either way we’re not getting that tax money, unless you think you can get the voters to overturn Prop 13 someday. It’s not fair, but maybe Prop 5 will at least loosen the housing market a little.<br />
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Apparently Prop 5 is the work of a group who stands to benefit greatly from the change: realtors. They feel like Prop 13 keeps people from buying new, expensive homes, so it prevents them from getting commissions on those sales. To us that sounds like another reason to repeal Prop 13, not expand its reach.<br />
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<b>Prop 6 </b>- Repeal gas tax - <b>No</b><br />
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This would repeal a 2017 gasoline tax approved by the legislature (with a two-thirds vote). The tax pays for roads and public transportation.<br />
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We love this tax! It pays for the right things. Oh, but it makes gas more expensive. We love expensive gas! Sell your SUV.<br />
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So, no.<br />
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<b>Prop 7</b> - Daylight Saving Time - <b>No</b><br />
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California conforms to the federal government’s definition of Daylight Saving Time due to an initiative passed in 1949. Prop 7 would undo that initiative, putting the decision back into the hands of the legislature, including the ability to opt for year-round daylight saving time (if the federal government approves). Apparently a large number of people favor year-round DST, so it is assumed the legislature would pursue that.<br />
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Is this initiative about putting control in the hands of the legislature, or is it more of a referendum on weather the public wants to change their clocks or not? We decided to treat it as a referendum. As we are mostly in favor in keeping DST the way it is, the majority of us voted no.<br />
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One thing that is certain is your faithful author likes to talk about this subject about 100 times more than anyone else, and so he will use his authorial privilege to do a deeper dive on the subject down below.<br />
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<b>Prop 8</b> - Kidney dialysis clinic price regulation - <b>No</b><br />
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Californians needing kidney dialysis treatment three times per week can visit a hospital or be treated in their homes, but most of them, roughly 80,000 patients, visit one of 588 dialysis clinics, usually for-profit companies with a combined annual revenue of $3 billion. These clinics cost more to visit than a hospital, but for some reason the majority of patients use clinics and private health plans are willing to pay for them. Perhaps they offer better service, or are more convenient? We’re not sure.<br />
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One thing we do know is that these dialysis clinics are generally not unionized, and that appears to be the real motivation behind this initiative, which was put on the ballot by the Service Employees International Union (SEIU). Prop 8 would put a cap on the overhead (including profits) dialysis companies are allowed to have, limiting them to 15% where they typically earn closer to 21%. Ostensibly this hopes to reduce costs and/or encourage the clinics to invest in equipment and staff, but really the goal is to hurt these non-union companies financially.<br />
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While there may be <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yw_nqzVfxFQ" target="_blank">reasons</a> not to like these clinics and we generally support unionized labor, we don’t think an initiative like this is the place to wage a union vs. non-union labor dispute. If passed, dialysis patients would be caught in the crossfire, potentially suffering reduced access to services and reduced quality of service, a service they desperately need. We would prefer the legislature regulate clinics in a more precise way. Leave us out of it.<br />
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<b>Prop 10</b> - Rent control expansion - <b>Yes</b><br />
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The Costa-Hawkins Rental Housing Act of 1995 is a statewide law limiting what kinds of properties can be subject to rent control. Rent control prevents landlords from raising the rent from year to year beyond a small inflation adjustment. Among the Costa-Hawkins restrictions is that no housing built after the passage of the law can be rent controlled, even if the surrounding community would like it to be. It serves the interests of landlords operating in a city like San Francisco who might be subject to rent control otherwise.<br />
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Prop 10 repeals the Costa-Hawkins limits, allowing cities to enact rent control if they choose to. Our endorsement of Prop 10 isn't about if rent control is good or bad, it's about who should be making that decision. We believe each city should be free to weigh the pros and cons, and make the decision that is best for their community. San Francisco (4th largest city in CA) has very different needs than Fresno (5th largest).<br />
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Economists universally dislike rent control because they believe it distorts markets and leads to a weaker economy overall, but the decision to impose rent control is usually cultural—the desire to have some cultural continuity in a city that might be going through economic upheaval. Then again, if you destroy your economy, your culture probably won't be too great either. We think each municipality should be able to make its own cultural decisions, but if you thought rent control was going to bring about a statewide economic collapse, that would be a good reason to vote No on Prop 10.<br />
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BTW, we find it pretty ironic that the California Republican Party opposes this. Whatever happened to small government? I guess not when there’s big money at stake.<br />
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<b>Prop 11</b> - Private-sector ambulance driver breaks - <b>Yes</b><br />
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Like police officers and firefighters, ambulance drivers are always on-call, even when taking a break for a meal or something. In a recent case, <i>Augustus v. ABM Security Services, </i>the California Supreme Court decided it was a violation of labor law for an employee to be on-call during breaks, and this likely would apply to the 75% of ambulance drivers who are private-sector employees.<br />
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Prop 11 would make an exception in the labor law for ambulance drivers and absolve their employers of past wrongdoings. While we are always on the side of the working man and don’t think companies who were breaking the law should get off scott-free, we think the on-call situation is industry-standard for this type of work and this was basically an honest mistake by the ambulance companies. We note that there is no argument against Prop 11 in the voter guide. A couple of us were not completely sure, but overall we voted Yes.<br />
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<b>Prop 12</b> - Standards for animal confinement - <b>Yes</b><br />
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What a blast from the past, during our very <a href="http://sf-reason.blogspot.com/2008/11/november-2008-endorsements.html" target="_blank">first one</a> of these meetings in 2008 we discussed Prop 2, which created new standards for storing animals at a factory farm. We were split at the time: we like animals, but were cautious about increasing the price of food while decreasing farmers’ taxable income and requiring money for enforcement.<br />
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Prop 12 makes Prop 2’s regulations more specific and what a difference 10 years makes: we are now all in favor of it (also, a reality TV star is President). Prop 12 is maybe something of a government overreach and it would be better if this were done in the legislature (as with all Propositions). It will raise the cost (but also quality) of meat somewhat but we think that’s fine, people can eat less meat.<br />
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Whoa, Diane Feinstein is actually <a href="https://feinsteinforca.com/" target="_blank">campaigning</a> a little, and <a href="https://www.c-span.org/video/?453176-1/california-senate-debate" target="_blank">debating</a> for the first time in almost two decades! As usual, Nancy Pelosi will not be debating (or even acknowledging) her <a href="https://www.remmer4congress.com/" target="_blank">opponent</a>.<br />
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<b>Results</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
Prop 1 - Yes<br />
Prop 2 - Yes<br />
Prop 3 - No<br />
Prop 4 - Yes<br />
Prop 5 - No<br />
Prop 6 - No<br />
Prop 7 - Yes<br />
Prop 8 - No<br />
Prop 10 - No<br />
Prop 11 - Yes<br />
Prop 12 - Yes<br />
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<b>TL;DR on Prop 7 - Daylight Saving Time</b><br />
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<i>Note: What follows is not the opinion our whole group, just the secretary.</i><br />
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When considering Prop 7, there are really two different issues at play. First, should the legislature be in charge of deciding to stick with DST or should the initiative process be used? Second, do we want to keep the current DST system or switch to something else?<br />
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<b>Legislature vs. Initiative</b><br />
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While our group spends an abnormally large amount of time considering these initiatives, we are actually pretty disdainful of the process. Initiatives are intended to give voters a direct say in creating laws, but in practice they give big-monied interests a direct say. An initiative takes money to collect signatures to get it on the ballot, and then more money to confuse people with ads convincing them to vote for/against it. The ads are effective because most initiatives are too complex or obscure to expect the electorate the make an informed decision—that’s what we have elected representatives for! If there was an initiative to ban initiatives in California, we would be completely for it. Let the legislators legislate! We will find another excuse to get together and drink beer.<br />
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So on this basis our group should be for Prop 7, which undoes a 1949 initiative and puts the legislature back in charge. It does not change our Daylight Saving Time situation in and of itself. But…maybe this is the one time where a statewide initiative makes sense. Daylight Saving Time is not that complex of a topic, and it is one that affects each individual voter. There is not really a morally correct side of the Daylight Saving debate, it’s more a matter of personal preference. So the logical way to proceed is to simply poll the citizens and do whatever the majority wants.<br />
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Australia has an <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daylight_saving_time_in_Australia" target="_blank">unusual</a> standardized time situation. They have three zones of unequal size, one of which is offset 30 minutes from the others. The half of Australia closer to the equator does not participate in Daylight Saving Time, while the Southern half does. Australians are continually debating the process and have held a number of referendums on the subject. A referendum is a government-run poll that is not legally binding, but which the legislators generally act upon to serve the will of the people. California initiatives are like referendums, but they actually do have the force of law behind them. Either way, when it comes to DST, it seems a statewide vote is totally appropriate, an argument against Prop 7.<br />
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<b>Pros and Cons of DST</b><br />
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Maybe we can all agree that Daylight Saving Time is a little strange. At some arbitrary time in the year we move the clocks forward, and then later move them back. The arbitrary time has been changed over the years, most recently extended in 2007. If time can be altered so readily, it hardly seems to be a standard measurement at all.<br />
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We now use DST 238 days out of the year, Standard Time for the remaining 35%, making Daylight Saving Time more standard than Standard Time. It’s done in the name of reclaiming sunlight. Days in winter are shorter, more so the farther you get from the equator. You are probably aware that the North Pole has 24 hours of daylight in Summer, non-stop darkness in Winter. At the equator, every day of the year is 12 hours long (which is why people near the equator don’t see the need for Daylight Saving Time). In the continental United States we are halfway between these two extremes.<br />
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During winter, our standard working hours are arranged so that the sun is shining during work. You can understand how important this was in the days before electric lights. As we get toward Summer, the day gets longer in <i>both directions</i>, both before we go to work and after we get home. But since people tend to wake up in order to go to work, those earlier hours of sunlight were being “wasted.” The obvious way to reclaim those hours would be to simply get up earlier, which would probably mean going to bed earlier. But then businesses would want to open earlier to serve the people out and about, which means many people would actually have to work earlier, their hours changing depending on the time of year. Many people’s schedules would not change, and then that unused sunlight in the morning would be made up for by turning the lights on at night. At some point an outside-the-box thinker came up with an idea for people to keep the same hours all year yet not waste the daylight: the clocks would be changed, and so we have DST.<br />
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Personally, I enjoy DST. I like to be outside, so an hour of extra sunlight is handy. But of course DST didn’t actually create that extra hour of daylight, all it did was compel me to do everything an hour earlier than I normally would. In the absence of DST I could simply alter my schedule, but I suppose I am a creature of habit like everyone else, and getting up at 9am on Saturday feels so earrrrly, 10am more reasonable. Most people have no control over when they have to be at work or school, which don’t seem inclined to change their hours over the course of the year, so DST gives them that extra hour.<br />
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So we like DST…why not have it all year long? We already use it 65% of the time, why not go to 100%? This to me is actually a little ridiculous. The entire point of DST is the switching, taking our normal routine and moving it in time. If we no longer switch, then what’s the point of being an hour off? We’re used to 9am as the start of work, but if want to permanently set the clock an hour ahead it would be just as easy to stay at Standard Time and get to work at 8am every day. Some see the 9am start as some sort of immutable law of work, but many people start work at different times, even those without flexible work schedules. Schools start at different times, even the New York Stock Exchange has changed the time of its opening bell over the years. If we can permanently alter our concept of time, we can permanently alter our schedules instead. People might say, “But I don’t want to start work at 8am!” I say, “But that’s what you’re actually doing!” Or if we’re arbitrarily moving our clocks to some future time, why stop at an hour? Think how late it would stay light if we fixed our clocks to the East Coast? Or London?<br />
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If we’re going to stop changing our clocks, we should stick with Standard Time. For me, it mostly comes down to the the guiding principle behind our timekeeping system. The sun may rise and set at different times depending on your position on the globe and the time of year, but there is one astronomical constant: the sun reaches its highest point at noon. Sailors once used this as the cornerstone of their navigation system. Many years ago every town’s time was slightly off as you traveled East to West; they stayed aligned with noon. This became a little strange with the advent of trains and train schedules, where you could travel for an hour but arrive only 45 minutes ahead on the clock. Or when the telephone was invented and you could talk to someone a few towns over, but not agree on what time it was. Time zones were soon created, with the result that the sun might not be at its highest point exactly at noon everywhere in the zone, but at least it’s close.<br />
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It just seems odd to me to permanently set our clocks an hour off, so the original definition of noon never applies. Perhaps it’s my fondness for astronomy and the workings of nature. Straying from noon seems like another part of the unreality of our times, where unscientific ideas like a flat Earth are getting more common, not less, despite the general advancement of science and access to knowledge. We are choosing to delude ourselves, holding feelings above facts. And just to be practical: do people really want the sun to rise at 8:25 in Winter? It was actually <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daylight_saving_time_in_the_United_States#1973%E2%80%931975:_Year-round_experiment" target="_blank">tried</a> back in 1974, and the country decided to end the experiment early.<br />
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Some people complain that changing clocks is too hard, but have these people ever flown across time zones on an airplane, or had an early meeting? Some attribute small increases in car crashes and heart attacks to springing forward, but then wouldn’t there also be the reverse effect when we fall back? Should we be just as concerned about the dangers of flying to Colorado? Must one be suicidal to contemplate a three-time-zone cross county trip? Do meeting planners have blood on their hands? These effects are too small to be considered legitimate arguments. One more thing: Daylight Saving was never done to help farmers, who usually oppose it because the sun is their guide and DST just makes everything close earlier.<br />
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If people prefer not to change clocks anymore, I can understand that. But wanting to separate the clock from the workings of nature and human tradition is illogical to me. If Prop 7 passes, it’s likely the legislature will attempt to give us permanent DST (at least until people demand it be rolled back (if the federal government approves to begin with)). So I will be voting against Prop 7. But hey, if it passes, that won’t be the end of the world. It’s just a personal preference and I can adjust my schedule to get back into the Standard Time lifestyle.<br />
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Brendanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15810877387574644692noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-167237386083437586.post-11243593244362776872018-10-26T08:28:00.002-07:002018-10-26T08:28:46.783-07:00Our Feelings About BondsThis group has a stance on bonds that seems common sense to us, but does not appear to be shared by many of our fellow Californians. While the majority of bond initiatives are passed by California voters, we usually vote against. It’s not that we’re against bonds in general, we’re simply against irresponsible bonds.<br />
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Some people seem to forget that a bond is a loan. It makes sense for you to take out a loan to buy a house, but it would be irresponsible to use one to pay the electric bill. Similarly, we’re fine using a bond to build a bridge, not fine using one to maintain a bridge. The former is a large one-time expense that a bond allows you to spread across many years, while the latter is an ongoing expense that should be part of the budget every year.<br />
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A bond is appealing if you think of it as free money, less appealing if you think of it as a way to nearly double the price of something (with the extra money going to bond purchasers, who are typically wealthy). Returning to the bridge example, the alternative to using a bond would be to save money for many years (not that government has shown any ability to save) and then finally build the bridge when you have enough. A bond lets you actually use the bridge during those years, which is arguably worth the cost of the interest you pay. Sometimes an initiative even identifies the source of the money that will be used to pay off a bond, like if you collected bridge tolls. Now, that’s a bond we could really get behind.<br />
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But more often than not, bond initiatives are maintenance-type projects that should be in the regular budget, and so we vote against them. Or frequently a proposition pays for something like building low income housing for bullied kids with cancer. Since we’re talking about building something, that sounds like the kind of bond we would support…except that in a state as large as California, low income housing needs to be built every year, so that too should be part of the regular budget. We’re not heartless, we want to help those kids too! We just want to do it responsibly. If there’s no room in the budget, cut something or create a new tax. That we would vote for.<br />
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So, to summarize: kids good, bonds (often) bad.<br />
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Brendanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15810877387574644692noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-167237386083437586.post-26256760362917992762018-06-05T03:45:00.001-07:002018-06-06T10:14:15.998-07:00June 2018 Endorsements<b>Prop. 68</b> - $4 billion bond for parks and the environment - <b>No</b><br />
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Look, we love parks too, but this is a great example of a bond being used to take out a loan to pay for things that should come out of the budget every year. This isn't a single massive thing like a bridge, it's hundreds or even thousands of state and local parks. Some of the money is used for maintenance, which definitely should be a regular budget thing, not a bond thing. In order to get this $4 billion now we would eventually pay $8 billion over 40 years. See our previous statements on bonds.<br />
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On the other hand, we really like parks. And fighting climate change. Perhaps more than fiscal responsibility. We really like that Prop 68 directs the money toward disadvantaged "parks poor" areas, making this a legitimate use of state-wide money.<br />
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But back to fiscal responsibility, there just seems to be no reason to do this with a bond. These projects will be done over a long period of time and California recently had a $6 billion surplus in <i>one year</i>. Also, Prop 68 has a laundry list of items, a list better poured over by full-time legislatures than the electorate. I mean, really, did you read the list of programs?<br />
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<b>Prop. 69</b> - Transportation revenues must be used for transportation - <b>Yes</b><br />
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Apparently there was a California law passed by the legislature that raised taxes and fees on gas and car registration, promising to only use that money on transportation. Except the legislature can't reserve the money for all taxes and all fees, so this prop would would cover the ones that aren't currently reserved. Sounds good to us.<br />
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One of the reasons this had to go to the ballot is because propositions are stupid. Thirty years ago, California passed a really stupid proposition that created what is known as a Gann limit—this prohibits state and local governments from spending revenue on a per person basis in excess of what was spent in 1978-79 and adjusted for inflation. All the legislature's new transportation fees would exceed this stupid Gann limit. So now here we are, thirty years later, voting on a stupid proposition because another stupid ill-thought out non-amendable proposition was stupidly passed and we have to make a carve out from the stupid Gann limit so that we can raise revenue that voters in 1988 could never comprehend (zero emission cars?). Stupid. Can we just vote on a proposition to eliminate propositions? Let the legislature legislate.<br />
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<b>Prop. 70</b> - Two-thirds majority required to use cap-and-trade funds - <b>No</b><br />
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This is an attempt by the minority to make it even harder for the majority to do things. Regardless of the substance (making it harder to spend environmental money, which we disagree with), no one should vote for this because it will have untold impacts forty years in the future.<br />
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Why is Jerry Brown listed as a supporter? Well, apparently he made a deal to support this initiative in order to keep the state's cap-and-trade system in place last year. OK, wink wink, hope you don't mind us voting no on this, Gov.<br />
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<b>Prop. 71</b> - Effective date for ballot measures - <b>Yes</b><br />
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Currently ballot measures (if successful) take effect the day after the election. Except you could have a case where an initiative was close and initially put into effect, only to be shut down when all the votes were counted and it turned out it lost. Prop 71 would instead say that the initiative takes effect 5 days after the Secretary of State certifies it. Fine, whatever.<br />
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This is the reality of the state moving towards more no excuse absentee voting. About 51% of votes are now cast by mail. This allows the County Boards of Election to count those votes.<br />
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<b>Prop. 72</b> - Build rain capture systems without reassessment - <b>Yes</b><br />
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This would allow people to build rain capture systems without having their property value reassessed as it usually is after any property improvement. Fine by us. We like rain. And systems. The voter guide has no arguments against.<br />
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One nice thing about Prop 72 is it uses the word "may" and leaves it up to the legislature on whether to actually implement this exclusion. If in future we need to revoke this proposition, we can without a statewide vote.<br />
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On the other hand there are quite a few properties out there in need of reassessment, but there is a greater need for water management.<br />
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<b>Bay Area Measure 3</b> - Raise bridge tolls, use money for various transportation projects - <b>Yes</b><br />
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Except for the zero-oversight Golden Gate Bridge, this would raise bridge tolls on the other Bay Area bridges and use the money to pay for a whole host of transportation improvements. We like that the money seems to be weighted in favor of public transit and the like, although it includes road improvements too. See, this is how you raise $4.5 billion without the use of bonds!<br />
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We do have some concern that bridge toll increases are essentially a regressive tax with greater proportional burden on the less fortunate. One member of our group, however, argues that the more deprived people in the Bay Area are typically farther from bridges, and yet they will still get their fair share of projects. We would probably prefer some sort of tax increase, but are willing to let it slide to get these projects going.<br />
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<b>Debate update:</b> Both Nancy Pelosi and Dianne Feinstein are up for re-election this year, but neither has agreed to participate in any primary <a href="http://www.latimes.com/politics/essential/la-pol-ca-essential-politics-updates-sen-dianne-feinstein-won-t-participate-1524782016-htmlstory.html" target="_blank">debates</a>. Feinstein says she will participate in a debate if there is a runoff.<br />
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<b>Results</b><br />
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Prop. 68 - Yes<br />
Prop. 69 - Yes<br />
Prop. 70 - No<br />
Prop. 71 - Yes<br />
Prop. 72 - Yes<br />
Measure 3 - Yes Brendanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15810877387574644692noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-167237386083437586.post-87148748704255185892018-06-04T01:16:00.000-07:002018-06-06T10:12:27.204-07:00June 2018 San Francisco Endorsements<b>Measure A</b> - SF PUC bonds for clean power - <b>Yes</b><br />
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The Public Utilities Commission can issue bonds for water and sewer projects with a 2/3 Board of Supervisors vote. Measure A would let them issue bonds for power generation too, a step toward offering an alternative to PG&E in SF. Measure A also says all power generation would have to be from green energy. Sounds good to us.<br />
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<b>Measure B:</b> Appointed board members forfeit positions when running for office - <b>No</b><br />
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Measure B would supposedly prevent someone with power in government from taking advantage of their position when campaigning for office. Oh, but only if that person was appointed; elected incumbents are free to do this as much as they want. So if you're a city commissioner and want to run against the people who appointed you, you first have to quit your job, so maybe you just won't run. This doesn't appear to be in the interest of the electorate so much as the Board of Supervisors.<br />
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<b>Measure C:</b> Tax leasing of commercial space, give money to kids - <b>No</b><br />
<b>Measure D:</b> Tax leasing of commercial space, give money to homeless instead - <b>No</b><br />
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Do you want to give money to child education programs or homeless programs? If both of these pass, only the one with the most votes goes into effect. We mostly like the sentiment behind these measures, but do not like the political gamesmanship behind them, so we'll be voting against them both.<br />
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<b>Measure E</b> - Prohibit the sale of flavored tobacco products - <b>Split</b><br />
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Half of us don't like prohibition of various substances, even ones that could be characterized as being aimed at kids (even though you have to be <a href="https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2016/05/05/476872674/california-raises-age-of-tobacco-purchase-to-21-and-tightens-vaping-rules" target="_blank">21</a> to buy them). The other half does like prohibition of smoking, so there you have it.<br />
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<b>Measure F</b> - Eviction legal defense program - <b>Yes</b><br />
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If you got evicted, would you have the resources to fight it legally? Many people would not. This would spend about $5 million per year to provide that service to tenants. Given the spate of evictions in SF lately, we like this.<br />
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<b>Measure G</b> - $298 per year parcel tax, give money to education - <b>Yes</b><br />
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OK, a modest tax with the money going to schools. Fine. But we don't think this will really do much. But fine. We like schools.<br />
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<b>Measure H</b> - Taser policy - <b>No</b><br />
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Should the electorate be setting police policy regarding tasers at the ballot box? Probably not. But really, this is the SFPD going around their bosses (the Mayor and Board of Supervisors) to get the taser policy they want written in stone. Bad idea.<br />
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<b>Measure I</b> - Don't encourage sports teams to move to SF - <b>Split</b><br />
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Some of us think taking the Warriors from Oakland just when they were getting good was an un-neighborly move. But then probably we should let voters decide on each specific sports team proposal, should one ever arise. Pretty sure this is non-binding anyway.<br />
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<b>Results</b><br />
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Measure A - Yes<br />
Measure B - Yes<br />
Measure C - Yes<br />
Measure D - No<br />
Measure E - Yes <br />
Measure F - Yes<br />
Measure G - Yes<br />
Measure H - No<br />
Measure I - No<br />
<br />Brendanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15810877387574644692noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-167237386083437586.post-70146075915214252672016-10-25T11:49:00.007-07:002018-06-05T01:15:34.828-07:00November 2016 EndorsementsAfter a year off, we're back with some more endorsements. Nine of us had some pretty thorough, sometimes contentious discussions. Fortunately there was <a href="http://www.goldenboypizza.com/" target="_blank">Golden Boy Pizza</a> to smooth everything out before all was said and done.<br />
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<b>Prop 51</b> - School bond - <b>No</b><br />
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Our group has always been more skeptical of bonds than your average voter. It seems most people forget that you actually have to pay bonds back…with interest (which in this case will be an additional $8.6 billion for a $9 billion bond).<br />
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Our usual test for a bond is: does it borrow money to pay for a large one-time expenditure that will have long-term benefits? So building a bridge would be a good case for issuing a bond, road maintenance would not.<br />
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Of Prop 51's $9 billion, $3 billion goes to new school construction, $3 billion for K-12 public school modernization, $1 billion to charter schools, and $2 billion to community colleges. At first glance it would appear that at least some of this money would pass our test.<br />
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After some discussion, the majority of us (7 of 9) decided it does not. While new school construction of any particular school is a one-time expenditure, in a state as large as California new schools need to be built every year, and schools need to be modernized every year.<br />
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The 2014-15 K-12 budget was $76.6 billion, an increase of $6.6 billion from the previous year, very close to the $7 billion this bond hopes to raise for K-12. We think the state can find money for this in the general fund. Or if they can't we suggest they raise taxes. They could at least send the $500 million annual debt service this bond would create directly to the schools.<br />
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<b>Prop 52</b> - Medi-Cal Hospital Fees - <b>Yes</b><br />
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This hospital "fee" is hilarious! The federal government matches whatever money the state sends to hospitals for Medi-Cal. So we charge those hospitals a fee and then give it right back to them along with matching Obamacare funds. Genius!<br />
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We're all for it. And we don't even feel bad because Californians will still send way more money to the federal government than we get back.<br />
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<b>Prop 53</b> - Statewide vote for revenue bonds - <b>No</b><br />
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Revenue bonds are different from regular bonds (i.e. general obligation bonds) because revenue bonds don't affect the state budget. The debt service is paid for using a toll or other charge. Maybe the people who put this on the ballot don't know the difference, because they find $2 billion of non-debt to be such a problem that entire state should have to grant approval through more of these cursed initiatives.<br />
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Had this been the law already the entire state would have had to vote for the Bay Bridge retrofit. Seems silly to us, so we're all against. One member of our group even pledged eternal scorn to anyone who signed a petition to put this on the ballot, just FYI.<br />
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<b>Prop 54</b> - Legislative transparency - <b>Yes</b><br />
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The main provision in this initiative doesn't allow the legislature to pass a bill until the final version of that bill has been posted on the interned for at least 72 hours. The legislature often sneaks in bills at the end of their session or sneaks amendments in, so this would make that much more difficult.<br />
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The majority of us (6 of 9) are in favor, because what's not to like about transparency?<br />
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The dissenters prefer the current system. For one thing, the legislature is mostly Democrat, so supposedly any tricks they pull are in our interests as fellow Democrats. Some were concerned that the extra transparency would really help out lobbyists, who the legislature is perhaps really trying to outwit (indeed, the Chamber of Commerce supports Prop 54).<br />
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And then as always there's the whole thing about why are we voting on something like this? It could be established by the legislature themselves through a rule, although it seems unlikely they would pass a rule forcing more transparency upon themselves.<br />
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<b>Prop 55</b> - Education and health care tax - <b>Yes</b><br />
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This extends <a href="http://sf-reason.blogspot.com/2012/11/2012-endorsements.html" target="_blank">2012's Prop 30</a> which created a new tax when California was in a pinch. The tax was only on earnings over $250k per year and used the money for education and health care, so we were all for it. It was temporary though, so now it is up for renewal.<br />
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Well, we're still for it. Remember how we don't like most bonds because we should be raising taxes instead? Well, here we are!<br />
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One member of our group wants Prop 30 to expire as it promised it would. His parents told him something about keeping your promises, blah blah blah. But if this were worded as an identical new tax he'd be all for it. Hrumph.<br />
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<b>Prop 56</b> - Cigarette tax - <b>Yes</b><br />
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California currently taxes cigarettes at 87¢ a pack, and Prop 56 would add an additional $2 on top of that. The money would mostly go to Medi-Cal and programs to keep people from smoking.<br />
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The majority (7 of 9) of us were in favor of this. I mean, have you heard that cigarettes are bad for you? The dissenters do not think the state should be interfering with personal decisions, tyranny of the majority and all that. Someone pointed out that this is a regressive tax, mostly paid by poorer people. Other comments made include a favoring of complete smoking prohibition, and someone finding smoking sexually unattractive (what has the supreme court said about a tax on un-sexiness?).<br />
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One interesting revelation from the discussion: cigarette smokers <a href="http://www.forbes.com/sites/timworstall/2012/03/22/alcohol-obesity-and-smoking-do-not-cost-health-care-systems-money/#1738d06413c2" target="_blank">do not cost the government more in medical expenses</a>! Turns out we've all got to go sometime, and providing health care for other terminal ailments is at least as expensive as treating a smoker with lung cancer. The coldly calculating among you could see smoking as a great way to prevent people from dying from heart disease, other cancers, Alzheimer's, etc. Food for thought…which we may also <a href="https://ballotpedia.org/San_Francisco,_California,_Soda_and_Sugary_Beverages_Tax,_Proposition_V_(November_2016)" target="_blank">start taxing</a>.<br />
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<b>Prop 57</b> - Parole for non-violent offenders - <b>Yes</b><br />
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This allows parole to be an option for non-violent offenders sentenced without the opportunity for parole. Given how crowded California prisons are and considering many of them are in there for drug offenses (some of which may soon be legal), we all are in favor.<br />
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We note that this does not instantly free prisoners, as they still have to go through the standard parole process. Some organizations claimed that violent offenders could be granted parole under Prop 57, but the supreme court <a href="http://scocal.stanford.edu/opinion/brown-v-super-ct-34481" target="_blank">disagreed</a>.<br />
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By the way, we were also a fan of the way Prop 57 shifts the determination for trying minors as adults from prosecutors to judges.<br />
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<b>Prop 58</b> - Bilingual education - <b>Yes</b><br />
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In 1996, California voters passed Proposition 227 mandating that all classes be taught in English. If an ESL student does not understand English well enough to take math classes in English, they are put into an intensive English program.<br />
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You may know this approach as "immersion," and some native English speakers have been known to enroll in Spanish or French immersion programs, but most opt for the standard "bilingual" approach. They speak Spanish in Spanish class, but everything else in their native language.<br />
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Prop 58 would open the bilingual option back up to to ESL students. Just as we would not want to force all native English speakers into immersion programs, we will stop forcing it upon Español estudiantes. Many students learn better this way, and it seems like the 1996 proposition comes from a mean-spirited time where illegal immigrants were blamed for a whole host of problems by then-governor Pete Wilson. Thank goodness we'll never hear talk like that <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jqn3V8EJVPg" target="_blank">ever again</a>.<br />
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<b>Prop 59</b> - Citizens United hooey - <b>Yes</b><br />
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This is some non-binding whatchamadingle saying we want California law makers to do everything they can the overturn <i><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citizens_United_v._FEC" target="_blank">Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission</a></i>. We mostly all agreed to vote for this, but we unanimously <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CZ1m39K4Tgw" target="_blank">rolled our eyes</a> over the <a href="https://youtu.be/q7vtWB4owdE?t=137" target="_blank">stupidity</a> of putting such a thing on the ballot.<br />
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<b>Prop 60</b> - Condoms in porn - <b>No</b> (bare-ly)<br />
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This would force adult film performers to wear condoms during the, uh, climax of their productions. Have you heard that it's good to practice safe sex? This was our most split decision, 3 in favor, 5 against, and 1 undecided, with some reversals in the process.<br />
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We were fortunate enough to have an OSHA employee in our ranks to represent this issue as an occupational safety problem. We require that workers in food service and health care use barriers in any situation where a pathogen might be transmitted to or from them, so why would this be any different? In fact, OSHA already has a condom rule in place, and in a way this initiative only pushes them to better enforce the existing policy.<br />
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On the other hand, for those other jobs that require barriers, the barriers don't theoretically prevent the job from being done satisfactorily. We hear from a guy who knows a guy whose cousin read a book about porn that those dirty, dirty porn watchers do not like to watch (or buy) porn when people are using condoms. If this rule were enforced, the most likely outcome is that condomless production will simply be shifted to another state. Goodbye tax dollars and baby oil sales.<br />
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The industry already polices itself very well, with performers getting tested constantly and <a href="http://abcnews.go.com/Health/porn-industry-shuts-hiv-positive-actor/story?id=21151207" target="_blank">shutting itself down</a> when an actor tests positive for HIV. But on the other hand, HIV does not appear in a test right away, meanwhile other performers could be infected. On the other other hand, adult video organizations claim there hasn't been an HIV infection during production in nearly a decade. There's also this new <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pre-exposure_prophylaxis" target="_blank">PrEP</a> drug that limits the transmission rate of HIV.<br />
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Another argument against Prop 60 is that by setting rules like this through initiative and not the legislature, they can only be repealed in the same manor. Or we didn't really like how Prop 60 would actually allow any California resident to sue the producer of any non-condom film if OSHA doesn't respond to a complaint, which could result in a flood of lawsuits. Oh, and there's also the whole thing about consenting adults who know the risks and are acting of their own free will, I think someone was hung up on that.<br />
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An unusual, maybe unprecedented, aspect of Prop 60 is that it carves out a special place in government for a single individual, the proponent of the act, a <a href="https://ballotpedia.org/Michael_Weinstein_(AHF)" target="_blank">Mr. Michael Weinstein</a>, president of the AIDS Healthcare Foundation. If Prop 60 passes but faces constitutional or statutory challenges (some think it will) and the Attorney General decides not to defend it, Prop 60 would empower him to take over the job of doing so, with state funding.<br />
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If all these idea-based arguments have you in a tizzy, it might interest you to know that Prop 60 is opposed by both the Democratic and Republican parties, plus just about every Democratic group you could name. <a href="http://www.bakersfield.com/opinion/protect-actors-punish-violators-vote-yes-on-prop/article_a774c253-765a-597d-9301-7d3a27d8cb37.html" target="_blank">Nearly</a> <a href="http://www.sfchronicle.com/opinion/editorials/article/A-condom-requirement-for-porn-actors-doesn-t-9198804.php" target="_blank">every</a> <a href="http://www.mercurynews.com/2016/08/18/mercury-news-editorial-vote-no-condom-measure-prop-60/" target="_blank">major</a> <a href="http://www.latimes.com/opinion/editorials/la-ed-vote-no-proposition-60-20160922-snap-story.html" target="_blank">newspaper</a> <a href="http://www.sacbee.com/opinion/election-endorsements/article100921742.html" target="_blank">in</a> <a href="http://www.fresnobee.com/opinion/editorials/article100943487.html" target="_blank">California</a> opposes it as well. Then again, we were never really into the whole conformity thing.<br />
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<b>Prop 61</b> - Restrict drug prices - <b>Yes</b><br />
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This would force drug buyers in the California government to never pay more than the Department of Veterans Affairs for drugs.<br />
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Well, who doesn't like paying less for drugs? Drug companies, that's who. And honestly, their opposition to this initiative was a big reason no one in our group was against it (although there were two abstentions).<br />
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One concern is that, by linking California with the VA, drug companies may drive a harder bargain with the VA, potentially hurting veterans. But then the California government is also buying these drugs for the disenfranchised, so we do not necessarily value the veterans' problems over theirs. And the percentage of drugs bought by the state is a small fraction of the overall drug sales in California; we think the drug companies will be fine.<br />
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<b>Prop 62</b> - Repeal the death penalty - <b>Yes</b><br />
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We wanted to get rid of the death penalty in <a href="http://sf-reason.blogspot.com/2012/11/2012-endorsements.html" target="_blank">2012</a>, and still do. It's not a deterrent, kills some innocent people, costs more money than life in prison, etc. All the information you could ever want is at <a href="http://deathpenaltyinfo.org/">deathpenaltyinfo.org</a>.<br />
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Wow, even the Democratic Party has finally <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/democratic-platform-death-penalty_us_5776d56de4b0a629c1aa0984" target="_blank">come around</a> on this one.<br />
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<b>Prop 63</b> - Ammo control - <b>Yes</b><br />
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This would apply the same California standards for gun control (background checks, licensed dealers, no guns for felons) to ammunition. Sounds reasonable to us, so we were generally for it (one person abstained). Prop 63 also bans large-capacity magazines, so that's cool.<br />
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One thing that gave us pause was that the opposition argument was written by representatives of law enforcement. They claim Prop 63 would divert law enforcement resources and was impossible to implement, but our unscientific conclusion was that cops like guns.<br />
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<b>Prop 64</b> - Marijuana legalization - <b>Yes</b><br />
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We wanted to legalize marijuana in <a href="http://sf-reason.blogspot.com/2010/10/november-2010-endorsements.html" target="_blank">2010</a>, and still do (8 in favor, 1 against). Back then we would have been the first state to do so, now we're following in the footsteps of Colorado, Washington, Oregon, and Alaska. Wow, the <a href="http://www.cademvote.org/endorsements" target="_blank">California Democrats</a> are in favor and even the national party is <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-politics/wp/2016/07/09/democrats-call-for-pathway-to-marijuana-legalization/" target="_blank">open to legalization</a> in a concession to Bernie Sanders supporters.<br />
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We had some concern that in the enthusiasm to legalize marijuana there is no effort to discourage consumption like you see with Prop 56 and cigarettes. Some claim that Prop 64 is good for big business and bad for small business, but we think those small businesses are really just people enjoying their ability to make money by skirting the current law under its lax enforcement.<br />
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<b>Prop 65</b> - Direct money from bag sales - <b>No</b><br />
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Prop 65 will dictate where money from carryout bag sales must go, if a charge on carryout bags exists (see Prop 67). Under Prop 65, the bag charge would go to a newly created environmental fund instead of to the stores to cover the cost of the bags themselves and to promote reusable bags.<br />
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Well, we think it's fine if the 10¢ goes to the store. Some claim that a bag actually costs more like 12¢, but it's a pretty insignificant charge regardless.<br />
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One suspicious thing about Prop 65 is that it's funded by the plastic bag companies, which did not make it any more attractive to us. Perhaps they're just trying to confuse people, perhaps they think the mandatory charge on bags is some sort of money grab by grocers instead of a disincentive to consumers.<br />
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Or another theory is that Prop 65 will actually prevent a bag ban if it gets more votes than Prop 67. To at least one member of our group, this does not seem very likely. Yes, there is a little aside on page 111 of the voter guide that has got everyone worked up:<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhwmFomolQzWfa9hujicacN0SSf52bNSXI7XzTRvFa-ePX4vPjvciro-zOIRaUvYFPXWVBHeGTKAerge5dZ-tKwkNfXssQ7nzmhsl48bvtDFjmGw5DACz86YT8H5N-OamHAjEkwCMpK3J-m/s1600/Screen+shot+2016-10-25+at+10.51.47+AM.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="51" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhwmFomolQzWfa9hujicacN0SSf52bNSXI7XzTRvFa-ePX4vPjvciro-zOIRaUvYFPXWVBHeGTKAerge5dZ-tKwkNfXssQ7nzmhsl48bvtDFjmGw5DACz86YT8H5N-OamHAjEkwCMpK3J-m/s400/Screen+shot+2016-10-25+at+10.51.47+AM.png" width="400" /></a></div>
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But after reading the actual text of the propositions and the <a href="http://senv.senate.ca.gov/sites/senv.senate.ca.gov/files/background_on_ltrhead.pdf" target="_blank">state's analysis</a>, this member thinks it is more likely a court will simply say Prop 65 overrules the bag charge use and leaves the rest of Prop 67 intact.<br />
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Not that it matters because none of us had a problem with the 10¢ charge going to the store, so we all voted No.<br />
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<b>Prop 66</b> - Death penalty reforms - <b>No</b><br />
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This would make changes to California's existing death penalty process to make it more efficient. Well, as opponents of the death penalty, we don't have much interest in that, so we all voted no.<br />
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And good thing we did, because it turns out Prop 66 is a poison pill! If it gets more votes than Prop 62 it will keep the death penalty in place. A member of our group found the key part of the initiative text:<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<i>This measure is intended to be comprehensive. It is the intent of the people that in the event this measure or measures relating to the subject of capital punishment shall appear on the same statewide election ballot, the provisions of the other measure or measures shall be deemed to be in conflict with this measure. In the event that this measure receives a greater number of affirmative votes, the provisions of this measure shall prevail in their entirety, and all provisions of the other measure or measures shall be null and void.</i></blockquote>
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<b>Prop 67</b> - Plastic bag ban - <b>Yes</b><br />
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Earlier this year the legislature passed <a href="http://californianewswire.com/landmark-california-plastic-bag-ban-signed-into-law-sb-270/" target="_blank">SB 270</a>, a statewide plastic bag ban, but the California constitution allows for a <a href="https://ballotpedia.org/Veto_referendum" target="_blank">veto referendum</a>, sending any legislative bill to the public for final approval or rejection if enough signatures are gathered, and that's what Prop 67 is.<br />
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Most of the members of our group have lived in San Francisco where there has already been a plastic bag ban since <a href="http://www.sfgate.com/green/article/S-F-FIRST-CITY-TO-BAN-PLASTIC-SHOPPING-BAGS-2606833.php" target="_blank">2007</a>, the first in the country. Plastic single-use bags are a particular environmental nuisance and we are happy to get rid of them. Paper is better but reusable is best, which is why there is a mandatory 10¢ charge on the paper bags, to ensure that consumers are given the option to not use any disposable bag and to encourage the use of reusable bags. One of our members commented that he originally thought the SF bag ban was going to be a hassle, but found out it really wasn't. We are unanimously in favor.<br />
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<b>Results</b><br />
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51 - Yes<br />
52 - Yes<br />
53 - No<br />
54 - Yes<br />
55 - Yes<br />
56 - Yes<br />
57 - Yes<br />
58 - Yes<br />
59 - Yes<br />
60 - No<br />
61 - No<br />
62 - No<br />
63 - Yes<br />
64 - Yes<br />
65 - No<br />
66 - Yes<br />
67 - YesBrendanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15810877387574644692noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-167237386083437586.post-68811087473175103892016-10-24T01:32:00.000-07:002016-11-10T09:56:01.147-08:00November 2016 San Francisco EndorsementsHoly Moly, there's a lot of things to vote on this time! Twenty four, to be exact. We were in danger of running out of letters there. Well, we discussed, and here are our conclusions.<br />
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<b>Prop A</b> - School bond - <b>Yes</b><br />
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This is a $744 million bond to do various school maintenance and upgrading activities. The debt service will be paid by a new property tax.<br />
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Historically, this group has voted no on bonds of this kind, because you pay almost as much in interest as the money you get for the actual thing you're trying get money for. And maintenance is the kind of thing should be done every year; it's not a one-time expense. Indeed, that is why one member voted against, saying they would be much more in favor of a new tax going directly to schools, not half to schools and half to bond investors.<br />
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But everyone else voted to take out a loan to do work on schools, so we voted Yes.<br />
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<b>Prop B</b> - City College Parcel Tax - <b>Yes</b><br />
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This levies a $79 per parcel tax and send the money to City College, extending the <a href="http://sf-reason.blogspot.com/2012/11/2012-endorsements.html" target="_blank">Prop A from 2012</a>. Well, that still doesn't sound like a lot of money, so we're still for it. Our one dissenter from this year's Prop A likes this approach to funding schools much more than a bond.<br />
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<b>Prop C</b> - Affordable housing spending - <b>Yes</b><br />
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Waaay back in 1992(!), voters authorized $350 million in bonds for affordable and market-rate housing upgrades. Of that, only $95 million has been spent…over 24 years!<br />
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Prop C expands the eligible uses for the rest of the money to include at-risk housing. Sure, why not? See you in another 24 years when there's still a lot of money left.<br />
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<b>Prop D</b> - Vacancy appointments - <b>Yes</b><br />
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This would put limits on the appointees named by the mayor to elected offices. Often these appointees have gone on to wield a lot of power *cough Gavin Newsom* and stick around for longer than originally anticipated *cough Ed Lee*. San Francisco voters seem to have great fondness for incumbents, so we want to shake that up.<br />
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Prop D is one of a series of measures intended to take power away from the mayor and place it in the hands of either the electorate or the board of supervisors. (See Props H, L, M.) Since we have not been big fans of the last few mayors (yeah, we're progressives), and think the City will continue to vote this way, we are for this.<br />
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<b>Prop E</b> - Sidewalk responsibility - <b>Yes</b><br />
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Did you know that property owners in SF are responsible for maintaining the sidewalks in front of their properties? Not totally sure how this became the modus operandi.<br />
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Prop E puts the responsibility back in the hands of the City. Apparently the cost will be $19 million…out of the City's $9 billion budget. Sounds doable. Nobody seems to be against this one.<br />
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<b>Prop F</b> - Local voting for 16 year olds - <b>No</b><br />
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This would let 16 year olds vote in local elections. Well, why is there a voting age anyway? Because we think that people below a certain age do not have the experience to make these decisions. Hey we were 16 once too, you know? In fact, we're not sure that 18 year olds have great judgement either, but if you can go die for your country, what the heck?<br />
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Anyway, back to the 16 year olds, we think they can wait. We also think those who put this on the ballot mainly just thought a vote by a 16 year old would be a vote for their policies.<br />
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<b>Prop G</b> - Police oversight - <b>Yes</b><br />
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This would *gasp* rename a police oversight group and insist that they take more interest in use-of-force and police misconduct issues. Well, they could do that stuff right now if they want (except maybe the renaming thing). This is stupid, but fine, we'll vote Yes.<br />
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<b>Prop H</b> - Public Advocate - <b>Yes</b><br />
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This would create an elected position of Public Advocate to work on behalf of voters on various issues. This type of stuff would usually be handled by a mayoral appointee, but we're looking to take power from the mayor, so we vote Yes.<br />
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<b>Prop I</b> - Funding for Seniors and Adults with Disabilities - <b>No</b><br />
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This is an earmark to divert money to certain people, people we are interested in helping out. But our group has historically been against earmarks (this one continues to the year 2037), and we still are. This money could be found in the regular budget through the regular political process, and we want it happen that way.<br />
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<b>Prop J</b> - Funding for Homeless and Transportation - <b>No</b><br />
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Another earmark, this time for two completely unrelated things: homelessness and transportation. We still don't like earmarks.<br />
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<b>Prop K</b> - Increase sales tax - <b>No</b><br />
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This would simply increase the SF sales tax. Well, sales taxes are regressive (they affect the poor more than the rich), so we're opposed. We prefer property taxes, payroll taxes, stuff like that.<br />
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<b>Prop L</b> - MTA appointments - <b>Yes</b><br />
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This would allow the board of supervisors to appoint some MTA seats instead of the mayor doing all the appointing. We want to take power from the mayor, so Yes.<br />
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<b>Prop M</b> - Housing and development appointments - <b>Yes</b><br />
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Take more appointments away from the mayor? Sounds good to us!<br />
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<b>Prop N</b> - Non-citizen voting in School Board elections - <b>No</b><br />
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Non-citizens voting? That's preposterous! Well, except many of these people pay taxes and non-citizen voting has been <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Right_of_foreigners_to_vote_in_the_United_States" target="_blank">common</a> in the past; there's even a <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Democracy-All-Restoring-Immigrant-Voting/dp/0415950732" target="_blank">movement</a> to re-instate it.<br />
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Like Prop F, we think this is just a ploy by certain people to get voting rights for people they think will be like-minded. Two thirds of us were against.<br />
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<b>Prop O</b> - Remove limits for Hunters Point development - <b>No</b><br />
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Way back in 1986 San Francisco passed a limit on the about of new office space that could be built in a year. Prop O would make an exception for a new development, which might not be a bad idea as this thing is way out where Candlestick Park used to be.<br />
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But then if you remember the traffic getting out of Candlestick, the area wasn't well-prepared to handle that many people 90 times a year, much less every workday. We think building slowly is smarter.<br />
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<b>Prop P</b> - Affordable housing bidding - <b>No</b><br />
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This would require at least three bids before one could be selected for an affordable housing project. But I guess there is often less than three bids available, so this is really a ploy to prevent more affordable housing from being built. Apparently over 3,000 current units would not exist if this rule had been in place. Nope!<br />
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<b>Prop Q</b> - Prohibit tents on sidewalks - <b>No</b><br />
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This would make it against the law for a tent to be set up on a sidewalk. In simple terms, this makes life harder for the homeless, so two thirds of us voted against.<br />
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Let's get a little more complex. Someone blocking a sidewalk with a tent or anything else is a nuisance. Actually, you already can't sit or lie on a sidewalk between 7am and 11pm thanks to a <a href="http://sf-reason.blogspot.com/2010/10/november-2010-endorsements.html" target="_blank">2010 ballot measure</a>. But if people are allowed to sleep on the streets at night, what's the harm in them having a tent at that time? Well yeah, they usually keep them up all day too, but how many of you have actually been impeded by such a tent? If this law said no tents during the day only, that would have swayed at least one of us to yes.<br />
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As it is, we were two thirds against. The dissenter pulled out his curmudgeon card, which our non-existant bylaws do not prohibit.<br />
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<b>Prop R</b> - Neighborhood crime unit - <b>No</b><br />
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This would require the police to dedicate a certain number of police to enforcing certain quality of life laws, particular those perpetrated by the homeless. Well, we're not really interested in micromanaging the police, so No.<br />
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<b>Prop S</b> - Hotel tax allocation - <b>No</b><br />
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This earmarks hotel tax funds for arts programs and homeless services. We like those things, but not earmarks, so No.<br />
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<b>Prop T</b> - Lobbyist restrictions - <b>Yes</b><br />
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This puts certain restrictions on lobbyists. Sounds good, and even the lobbyists couldn't be bothered to lobby against this one in the election materials.<br />
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<b>Prop U</b> - Affordable housing redefinition - <b>No</b><br />
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This would drastically redefine affordable housing in SF. What is currently reserved for a person making $41,450 a year would be accessible to people making double that, i.e. $82,950. So of course we're against this, right?<br />
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Well, there was a dissenter, and at this point in the night he accounted for half of the vote (why weren't you there, reader?). His rationale is that SF's affordable housing situation has created a Tale of Two Cities, where the low-income half lives in the vicinity of all San Francisco has to offer, but doesn't actually get to participate. Meanwhile, many middle-income people (teachers for example) who would be able to participate in the culture are forced out. While our dissenter appreciates the sentiment, he doesn't think low-income housing is really doing anyone any favors. But then again, Prop U goes too far. Someone making over $80k can get qualify for affordable housing? That's more than starting salary at Google.<br />
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<b>Prop V</b> - Soda tax - <b>No</b><br />
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This is a soda tax. It's not a grocery tax (except for the soda part of your groceries). It's designed to change people's behavior for the better by charging them more for something that's bad for their health.<br />
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Well, believe it or not, us liberal nanny-staters are all against it. Shoot us, we think the government shouldn't be penalizing people for their personal choices that don't affect other people. Yes, soda is bad for you, and yes a tax could reduce consumption, but we simply don't believe this is a role the government should have. Oh, but someone says obesity costs the health system more? <a href="https://mic.com/articles/5871/study-obesity-related-diseases-do-not-raise-health-care-costs#.loPhwPUYU" target="_blank">Actually, it doesn't</a>. And it seems a little inconsistent to tax soda, but not ice cream or fried food or our sedentary lifestyles, which are at least as big contributors.<br />
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<b>Prop W</b> - Property transfer tax - <b>Yes</b><br />
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This will tax the sale of properties over $5 million. Well, we think people dealing in valuable property like that will be just fine, and we don't think the rental market will be affected. Tax the rich!<br />
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<b>Prop X</b> - Mission art space preservation - <b>Yes</b><br />
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Just as new housing in SF has to leave space for low-income people, this would require Mission and SoMa developments to leave space for art and small business spaces. Just trying to hold on to some semblance of the City's character, you know. Sorry if you were hoping to put your next app startup in one of those spots.<br />
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<b>Measure RR</b> - BART bond - <b>No</b><br />
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This is a $3.5 billion bond to repair and upgrade BART. As a bond it will eventually accrue as much interest as principal, but it will be paid for by a property tax.<br />
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We are fans of the BART system, but don't like this measure. Our biggest beef was the part about 1/3 of the money being spent on prior debts acquired by paying workers overtime, which is often <a href="http://www.mercurynews.com/2016/11/01/bart-janitor-grossed-270k-in-pay-and-benefits-last-year/" target="_blank">very excessive</a>. In one of our member's words, this is a management issue being presented as a fiscal issue.<br />
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Dear, BART, come back to us next year with a better bond deal and we'll vote for it.<br />
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<b>Nancy Pelosi</b><br />
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Well, she does have a <a href="http://www.pelosiforcongress.org/" target="_blank">campaign website</a> this time, although no issues or anything, just a form to send money. She also has an opponent, <a href="http://www.picus2016.com/" target="_blank">Preston Picus</a>, who shares many liberal beliefs. Naturally, Pelosi won't <a href="http://www.picus2016.com/home" target="_blank">debate</a> him. Let's look back at this <a href="http://www.fogcityjournal.com/wordpress/2409/gonzalez-pens-open-letter-to-pelosi/" target="_blank">Matt Gonzalez gem</a>.<br />
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<b>Results</b><br />
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A - Yes<br />
B - Yes<br />
C - Yes<br />
D - No<br />
E - Yes<br />
F - No<br />
G - Yes<br />
H - No<br />
I - Yes<br />
J - Yes<br />
K - No<br />
L - No<br />
M - No<br />
N - Yes<br />
O - Yes<br />
P - No<br />
Q - Yes<br />
R - No<br />
S - Yes<br />
T - Yes<br />
U - No<br />
V - Yes<br />
W - Yes<br />
X - Yes<br />
RR - YesBrendanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15810877387574644692noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-167237386083437586.post-69456030996797240882016-10-22T08:00:00.000-07:002016-10-25T11:51:57.857-07:00What is this?We're a group of friends with somewhat nerdy tendencies such as sitting down before elections to hash through all the various California state and San Francisco city ballot propositions. We spend several hours researching and debating, and then write up our results, which people hopefully find useful, informative, or entertaining.<br />
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<a href="http://eepurl.com/rqiGH">Subscribe to our email list</a> (one email per election)Brendanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15810877387574644692noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-167237386083437586.post-55295436761375624842014-10-23T22:56:00.001-07:002014-11-05T08:41:15.181-08:00November 2014 EndorsementsGot a lot of propositions on the ballot this time around, especially if you live in San Francisco. So let's get right to it, shall we? (Well, after you try the effects of <a href="http://sf-reason.blogspot.com/2014/10/truth-in-advertising.html" target="_blank">ad-only voting</a>.)<br />
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<b>Prop 1</b> - Water bond - <b>Yes</b><br />
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Prop 1 is a $7.12 billion bond to build increased water capacity and perform other water-related work. Seems like a pretty good idea in these years of drought, which are only bound to become more common if those <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_scientists_opposing_the_mainstream_scientific_assessment_of_global_warming" target="_blank">98% of climate scientists</a> are right.<br />
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Now, we have a history of being against bonds, because they tend to be used for short-term projects that belong in the regular budget. Well, this is not one of those bonds. We like nearly everything about it, especially the part about building infrastructure for water recycling and the way it only matches the money put forth by local utilities.<br />
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<b>Prop 2</b> - Budget Stabilization Account changes - <b>Yes</b></div>
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Prop 2 would pre-allocate 1.5% of the state's general fund revenues to the Budget Stabilization Account. The BSA already exists, but Prop 2 would change the rules about how money is put into it and how it can be taken out.</div>
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To be sure, we are not fans of this pre-allocation business. Some high percentage of the California budget is earmarked, preventing legislatures from, you know, legislating. This is reason enough for at least one of us to refuse to vote for Prop 2 regardless of what it may contain.</div>
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For the rest of us, Prop 2 is using a bad tool to do a responsible thing. It saves money for lean years and pays off debt. The major opposition to Prop 2 ostensibly comes from people in education, whose school districts will receive caps on their own rainy-day savings. Apparently the state would like to handle the way state money is saved up, thank you very much. That seems reasonable to us, so we're voting Yes.</div>
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<b>Prop 45</b> - Health insurance regulation - <b>Yes</b></div>
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California has an Insurance Comissioner in charge of regulating car, homeowner, and other insurance. But health insurance (health insurance!) is not on her list, unless Prop 45 passes.</div>
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Why wouldn't we want this? Especially now that health insurance is mandated by Obamacare, there needs to be a mechanism to keep costs down. There are government bodies that publish information on insurance plans and permit plans to appear on the Covered California exchange, but they have no power to actually prevent an insurance company from raising rates.</div>
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Even though we're all voting yes on this, our cynical outlook makes us think California will likely fail to pass this proposition, largely due to the advertising blitz put on by all the major health insurance companies. One claim they make is that it'll give one politician too much power, a politician who can be corrupted by political donations. Oh, you mean the Insurance Commissioner, a job that's been in place for decades? The same ads also claim rates will go up, but we really doubt the commissioner will start rejecting plans because they're too cheap. Lies, all lies!</div>
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<b>Prop 46</b> - Medical malpractice - <b>No</b></div>
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Prop 46 is really three laws in one.</div>
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First, it mandates drug and alcohol testing for doctors. Who wouldn't want that? Well, maybe those of us who don't like the idea of doctors failing a drug test because of marijuana they smoked a month ago on their Jamaican vacation. Also, hospitals are free to institute their own drug programs, although the attorney among us expressed doubts that they would do so (for liability reasons, oddly enough).</div>
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Second, Prop 46 would require doctors to use a state-wide drug prescription database whenever someone tries to get their hands on OxyContin and other abused prescription drugs. We aren't opposed to this, but nor are we wildly enthusiastic as we think it probably won't do much to slow down the OxyContin train (how much does marijuana prohibition slow the flow of pot?).</div>
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But really, the meat of Prop 46 is it will raise the cap on pain and suffering damages, generating a potential windfall for the lawyers who wrote this. The other two provisions were really just sugar coating for this one. Now, it is true that the present $250,000 cap was put in place in 1975, and raising it to over $1 million is in line with inflation. But it's also true that every state we looked up had a lower cap, and the majority of us were not interested in seeing it increased.<br />
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Holding the minority view, our attorney friend (who once worked for hospitals <i>against</i> medical malpractice lawsuits) is in favor of Prop 46 because he feels an increase is due, and points out that it will match Wisconsin's cap. He also points out that medical malpractice lawsuits have a <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medical_malpractice#The_medical_malpractice_claim" target="_blank">higher barrier to entry</a> than regular lawsuits, so those rewards are more likely to be delivered to people deserving of them.</div>
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<b>Prop 47</b> - Reduce criminal sentences - <b>Yes</b></div>
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Prop 47 lowers the punishment for a host of non-violent crimes, many of which jam up our prisons, which then sucks more money out of the state's coffers. If you're a macho tough-on-crime type, you probably want to vote against this, but we're all peace-and-love hippie types, so we're voting for it.</div>
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<b>Prop 48</b> - New Indian casino - <b>Yes</b></div>
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To most of us, Prop 48 simply asks: do you want another Indian casino somewhere in Southern California? Our answer would probably be, "Sure, fine, why are you bothering me with this?" And indeed, if you're OK with Indian gaming, you're probably fine with Prop 48.</div>
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If you want to know the details, there are a couple tribes who live near well-loved National Parks, perhaps not an ideal place for gambling. A big casino on the shores on Mono Lake? No thanks.</div>
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But it happens that they own some other less-pretty land elsewhere. It's not part of their original reservation, but most people can agree it'd be much better to build a casino there. The Governor stuck a deal, and Prop 48 will ratify it.</div>
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The people who don't like this idea are the tribes who already have casinos in the area and aren't keen on extra competition. Well, we don't think it's too nice to keep other tribes from enjoying the same benefits they do, so we're voting yes on this.</div>
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<b>SF Prop A</b> - Transportation bond - <b>Yes</b></div>
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Prop A is a $500 million bond to do a whole host of transportation-related work. We're usually pretty skeptical about bonds, but this one manages to pass the test, mostly dedicating itself to tasks that are long-term in nature. But what we really like about Prop A is that it actually tries to pay for itself with a small property tax increase. Count us in!</div>
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<b>SF Prop B</b> - SFMTA funding - <b>No</b></div>
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Every year, SFMTA gets a percentage of the city budget, and so that percentage rises and falls based on tax revenues. Prop B would instead track population, which makes sense given that their transportation workload is stays the same even in a recession year. </div>
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We're not a big fan of earmarks, but this is just choosing between one and another. We decided to vote No, thinking that SFMTA should face cutbacks just like every other department in those lean years. They can hardly claim to have no room for running themselves more efficiently.</div>
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But the big news in Prop B is our old buddy/nemesis, Terence Faulkner. He's back, and with a real gem right out of the gate. He quotes Casanova! Read it in your voter guide.</div>
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<b>SF Prop C</b> - Children's Fund - <b>Split</b></div>
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We'll say it again, we don't like earmarks. And Prop C is an earmark…for children's programs. Crap.</div>
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Sorry folks, we don't have the guts to vote against children, so we're going to say we're split on this one (even though we had an odd number of participants). You're on your own.</div>
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(The satirical argument against this one in the voter guide is pretty good though.)</div>
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<b>SF Prop D</b> - Development Agency pensions - <b>Yes</b></div>
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Prop D is a strange thing to be voting on. About 50 people were working for a state agency operating here that was converted into a city department, but their pensions didn't transfer. For technical reasons, the City can't just make it right. (We're actually not a big fan of pensions, but that's a story for another time.) We feel like giving these folks a break.</div>
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<b>SF Prop E</b> - Soda tax - <b>Yes</b></div>
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Prop E is our soda tax, adding 2¢ per fluid ounce to soft drinks. Clearly this sugar water is bad for you, and you may have noticed that there's a lot of obesity in America. Soda is especially marketed at kids, whose obesity rates have tripled or more since 1980. The money from this goes to kids recreation programs. For most of us, that's enough reason to vote yes.</div>
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The remaining member of our group has some Libertarian tendencies, so he doesn't like the idea of government singling out one arbitrary bad habit and extracting money from it. If sugar is the problem, why aren't we also looking to tax Kara's Cupcakes, Bob's Donuts, Bi-Rite Ice Cream, The Crème Brûlée Cart, and The Ice Cream Bar? He suspects it's simply because we like those things, but not soda. Anyway, he's in the minority.</div>
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<b>SF Prop F</b> - Pier 70 development height - <b>Yes</b></div>
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If you will recall, we were against the notion that voters should be put in charge of planning when the job really belongs to the planning commission. This fact alone makes us want to vote against those Prop B people and approve any tall building proposal sent our way, simply out of spite. And then we looked into this project and decided that we actually would like it to go forward. So instead of voting Yes purely out of spite, we're voting half for spite, half because it's actually a good idea.</div>
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When reviewing the arguments against this, we once again run into our frienemy Terence Faulkner. And what's this, he has a new title since we saw him last in Prop B? And yet another title in his statement on the very next page? Hold on, we need to make a table for this:<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiqy94f_tdVGOY7_agYLlz_MSdE36O9hHiKf4PjeYdnQBh8OVEptRtwfSbGpN6ZfABfuESImV61X2gidx7lgLjt8ArjMtEicG1bFhbzao2HzFPhyphenhyphenCTVHMcgTOUdNJq9l5O3zFC4nOMDuoR6/s1600/Terence+Faulkner+titles.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiqy94f_tdVGOY7_agYLlz_MSdE36O9hHiKf4PjeYdnQBh8OVEptRtwfSbGpN6ZfABfuESImV61X2gidx7lgLjt8ArjMtEicG1bFhbzao2HzFPhyphenhyphenCTVHMcgTOUdNJq9l5O3zFC4nOMDuoR6/s1600/Terence+Faulkner+titles.png" height="123" width="400" /></a></div>
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<b>SF Prop G</b> - Housing speculators' tax - <b>Yes</b></div>
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Prop G will levy a large tax on the sale of a multi-unit property (30 units or less) if the owner has had it for fewer than 5 years. This will slow down or stop the flipping of apartment buildings in San Francisco.<br />
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The <a href="http://www.sftu.org/ellis.html" target="_blank">Ellis Act</a> is a California law that allows landlords to evict tenants if they are planning to take their property off the rental market, either by converting it to condos or by inhabiting it themselves. With the influx of tech money in San Francisco, this could be a lucrative option, especially if a building is occupied by long-term, low-paying renters.<br />
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How are these two things related? While any landlord is free to invoke the Ellis Act at any time, it's unlikely that a long-time landlord would suddenly decide to do this. But if a building is flipped over and over again, each new owner will likely consider the condo conversion option. According to the <a href="https://antievictionmap.squarespace.com/" target="_blank">Anti-Eviction Mapping Project</a>, 78% of Ellis Act evictions between 2009 and 2013 were in buildings that had changed hands within five years.<br />
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Like many, we have been bothered to see how an influx of money, largely from tech workers, has been changing the character of San Francisco. Prop G will do something to stem the tide, so we are for it.<br />
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<b>SF Prop H</b> - Don't change fields - <b>No</b></div>
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You probably heard about the recent <a href="http://missionlocal.org/2014/10/turf-wars-at-mission-soccer-field/" target="_blank">scuffle over a field</a>, which apparently are in relatively short supply in SF. How great then, that private donors have put up the money to make existing fields in Golden Gate Park twice as functional by adding lights (so you can play at night) and artificial turf (so the field isn't closed during the damp winter).</div>
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Well, the Prop H people don't think so. They worry about extra lights and the environmental impact of artificial turf. But we'll point out that they live in a city with tons of lights already and living grass fields have their own environmental impact (fertilizer, etc.).</div>
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So we're voting No on this, which means Yes, we want more functional fields.</div>
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<b>SF Prop I</b> - Don't not change fields - <b>Yes</b></div>
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Prop I is a "poison pill". If Prop H passes but Prop I gets more votes, the fields will still get renovated. Whatever happened to just vote No? Whatever.</div>
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So I suppose we're going to vote yes on this for same reason we're voting No on H. We also like that Prop I includes an environmental impact provision, although we're pretty sure that it was going to be done anyway if it hadn't already been.</div>
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<b>SF Prop J</b> - Minimum wage increase - <b>Yes</b></div>
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Two of us like minimum wage. One has reservations.</div>
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Federal minimum wage is $7.25, California minimum wage is $9.00, and San Francisco's minimum wage is $10.74. But it was established back in 2003 and hasn't been updated for inflation. Prop J would increase minimum wage dramatically, up to $15 per hour by 2018. For most of us, that was enough to vote for this automatically.</div>
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Our Libertarian is more skeptical about raising minimum wage. Economic theory states that while some people will get paid more, others will lose their jobs entirely. France has a very high minimum wage, and very <a href="http://www.economist.com/news/leaders/21591593-moderate-minimum-wages-do-more-good-harm-they-should-be-set-technocrats-not" target="_blank">high youth unemployment</a> as a result. Those who lose their jobs will probably find little consolation in knowing that some of the still-employed are getting paid more than before.</div>
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But then, how much can you raise minimum wage before it starts to significantly impact jobs? Turns out the answer to that is <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minimum_wage#Empirical_studies" target="_blank">not really known</a> because there isn't much data on the subject, especially for an increase as large as this one. So in the name of science and experimentation, this last person has decided they are also in favor of Prop J, interested to see what the jobs impact winds up being (and keeping an eye on <a href="http://money.cnn.com/2014/06/02/news/economy/seattle-minimum-wage/" target="_blank">Seattle</a> too).</div>
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<b>SF Prop K</b> - Affordable housing - <b>No</b></div>
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Prop K is some sort of non-binding statement that the City will try to make housing more affordable. Excuse me, non-binding? And this was put on the ballot by all the Supervisors? Give us a break. We're voting no once again for…spite!</div>
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<b>SF Prop L</b> - SFMTA fines and fees - <b>No</b></div>
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What's this, a second non-binding statement is on the ballot? At least they got signatures to put this one up, but come on.</div>
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If this were actually law, we'd be in favor of it! The SFMTA has been running away with fines and fees, and we think it's gone too far. So how about we actually do something?</div>
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We're playing our spite card again, and voting no.</div>
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<b>Debaters only</b><br />
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We've said it <a href="http://sf-reason.blogspot.com/2012/11/2012-endorsements.html" target="_blank">several times before</a>: we won't vote for candidates who don't debate. And once again that means we won't be voting for Nancy Pelosi, who has really made no indication that she's even running.<br />
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Jerry Brown has only <a href="http://www.c-span.org/video/?321191-1/california-governors-debate" target="_blank">debated once</a>, but that's a heck of a lot better than zero.<br />
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<b>Wednesday morning update - the <a href="http://vote.sos.ca.gov/returns/ballot-measures/" target="_blank">results</a>:</b><br />
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Prop 1 - Yes<br />
Prop 2 - Yes<br />
Prop 45 - No<br />
Prop 46 - No<br />
Prop 47 - Yes<br />
Prop 48 - No<br />
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<a href="http://sfgov2.org/ftp/uploadedfiles/elections/ElectionsArchives/2014/Nov/Summary4.pdf" target="_blank">SF Results</a><br />
Prop A - Yes<br />
Prop B - Yes<br />
Prop C - Yes<br />
Prop D - Yes<br />
Prop E - No (got 55% of the vote, but needed 2/3 to pass)<br />
Prop F - Yes<br />
Prop G - No<br />
Prop H - No<br />
Prop I - Yes<br />
Prop J - Yes<br />
Prop K - Yes<br />
Prop L - No<br />
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Not even a tweet from <a href="https://twitter.com/NancyPelosi" target="_blank">@NancyPelosi</a> thanking people for re-electing her.</div>
Brendanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15810877387574644692noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-167237386083437586.post-66921895988971533282014-10-06T20:53:00.000-07:002014-10-15T12:53:08.084-07:00Truth in Advertising?We thought we'd maybe try a little experiment: what conclusions would you come to if you based your voting decisions purely on political advertising? How would those decisions change once you did actual research?<br />
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If you want to try this and jot down your results, here are the relevant links:<br />
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Prop 1<br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;"><i>(Oddly, Prop 1 does not appear in the California voter guide, it's in the <a href="http://vig.cdn.sos.ca.gov/2014/general/en/pdf/complete-vig-suppl-v2.pdf" target="_blank">supplement</a>)</i></span><br />
Yes: <a href="http://www.yesonprops1and2.com/prop-1" target="_blank">Website</a>, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ohpIg-FEHs" target="_blank">Video</a>, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_f6jzh5fU3U" target="_blank">Video</a><br />
No: <a href="http://www.noonprop1.org/" target="_blank">Website</a>, <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MSWBMIWa3tg" target="_blank">Video</a><br />
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Prop 2<br />
Yes: <a href="http://www.yesonprops1and2.com/prop-2" target="_blank">Website</a>, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Dgoj1Nr3K8" target="_blank">Video</a>, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o4eovmzJjPI" target="_blank">Video</a><br />
No: <a href="http://www.2badforkids.org/" target="_blank">Website</a>, <a href="http://www.facebook.com/EducateOurState" target="_blank">Facebook</a><br />
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Prop 45<br />
Yes: <a href="http://www.yeson45.org/" target="_blank">Website</a>, <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lPoN1WI6OuU" target="_blank">Video</a>, <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OtUNlLzWP9s" target="_blank">Video</a>, <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nfo8me4XCZg" target="_blank">Video</a><br />
No: <a href="http://stophighercosts.org/" target="_blank">Website</a>, <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EuM0B0Zt-1c" target="_blank">Video</a>, <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VBKN6iKjqTM" target="_blank">Video</a>, <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fgld7Rpbupc" target="_blank">Video</a>, <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bWoVU_xhtOY" target="_blank">Radio Ad</a><br />
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Prop 46<br />
Yes: <a href="https://www.yeson46.org/" target="_blank">Website</a>, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yADJPX7g5xY" target="_blank">Video</a>, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4XeRdOMSGUU" target="_blank">Video</a><br />
No: <a href="http://www.noon46.com/" target="_blank">Website</a>, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AyxrDdfryi0" target="_blank">Video</a>, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lTO0xvTZfYI" target="_blank">Video</a>, <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d0MTQgUEY9k" target="_blank">Video</a>, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mIyzUVZTjZQ" target="_blank">Video</a><br />
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Prop 47<br />
Yes: <a href="http://safetyandschools.com/" target="_blank">Website</a><br />
No: <a href="http://www.crimevictimsunited.com/crime-victims-united-law-enforcement-and-the-california-district-attorneys-association-oppose-proposition-47/" target="_blank">Related Website</a><br />
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Prop 48<br />
Yes: <a href="http://www.voteyes48.com/" target="_blank">Website</a><br />
No: <a href="http://stopreservationshopping.com/" target="_blank">Website</a>, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7yH7x4K1uic" target="_blank">Video</a><br />
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<i>The local SF propositions often don't have advertising budgets, so I couldn't find anything for A, B, C, D, J, and K. Maybe advertising will appear as the election nears. If you see something, let us know in the comments.</i><br />
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SF Prop E<br />
Yes: <a href="http://www.choosehealthsf.com/" target="_blank">Website</a><br />
No: <a href="http://www.VoteNoOnPropE.com/" target="_blank">Website</a>, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZvvSsFCU4II" target="_blank">Video</a>, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BAZVRhXqBo8" target="_blank">Radio</a><br />
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SF Prop F<br />
Yes: <a href="http://www.pier70sf.com/" target="_blank">Website</a>, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dDA7f5WRrwk" target="_blank">Video</a><br />
No: <i>None</i><br />
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SF Prop G<br />
Yes: <a href="http://www.speculationfreesf.com/" target="_blank">Website</a>, <a href="http://www.youtube.com/user/SpeculationFreeSF" target="_blank">YouTube Channel</a><br />
No: <a href="http://www.stopthehousingtax.com/" target="_blank">Website</a><br />
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SF Prop H<br />
Yes: <a href="http://protectggp.wordpress.com/" target="_blank">Blog</a><br />
No: <i>None</i><br />
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SF Prop I<br />
Yes: <a href="http://www.letsfkidsplay.com/" target="_blank">Website</a><br />
No: <a href="http://protectggp.wordpress.com/" target="_blank">Blog</a><br />
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SF Prop L<br />
Yes: <a href="http://www.restorebalance14.org/" target="_blank">Website</a><br />
No: <a href="http://www.nogridlocksf.com/" target="_blank">Website</a><br />
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<br />Brendanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15810877387574644692noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-167237386083437586.post-21310196297906939462014-06-03T08:14:00.000-07:002014-06-04T10:03:02.782-07:00June 2014 EndorsementsThere's a primary election today, the first open primary under the new system installed by voters in 2010. We <a href="http://sf-reason.blogspot.com/2010/06/june-2010-endorsements.html" target="_blank">predicted</a> this new system would not be an improvement, and now we get to find out. We don't endorse candidates, but there are a few state and city ballot measures to opine on briefly.<br />
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<b>Prop 41</b> - Veteran's housing bond - <b>No</b><br />
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In every election we vote on bonds, and so every year we present our view on bonds. We believe a bond makes sense if, and only if, the thing you're spending money on is paid for in one year, but the benefits extend over many years. For example, if you wanted to build a new park, go ahead and issue a bond for that. If you need to do maintenance on existing parks, that is ongoing and needs to be in the regular budget. If government doesn't presently have the money, they need to raise taxes and/or make cuts elsewhere.<br />
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On the surface, a $600 million project to build veteran housing sounds like the kind of thing a bond would be good for, but actually housing veterans is an ongoing problem that will not be permanently solved by this or any other bond. It needs to be in the regular budget, so we are voting No.<br />
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Additionally, it appears the money for the project is already available via a 2008 bond measure, but said money has been shuffled around by lawmakers to create the appearance of a gaping hole to necessitate borrowing. Nice try.<br />
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<b>Prop 42</b> - Local government transparency - <b>Yes</b><br />
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California has laws that require local governments to be transparent. But transparency ain't free, and the state has been reimbursing these governments for the cost of complying with the law. Attempting to balance the budget, Jerry Brown said he would not pay for it any more, although he probably does not have the authority to do that.<br />
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Prop 42 would put it into law that local governments have to pay for their own transparency. This makes sense to us, as communicating with the public is an essential part of being a democracy. Also, the current reimbursement situation puts incentives in the wrong place—local governments have no reason to do it efficiently if they don't have to foot the bill.<br />
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<b>SF Prop A</b> - Public safety bond - <b>Split</b><br />
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We are really on the fence here, so I guess you'll have to decide for yourselves, dear readers. The reason for our ambivalence is that there is a split among the things this $400 million bond would supposedly be spent on.<br />
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The most-touted items, retrofitting fire stations and upgrading the Emergency Firefighting Water System, are mid-length projects that we'd argue should be in the regular budget.<br />
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There is also a new seismically-safe building in the proposal, so that at least is ripe for a bond. But then it would constitute the minority of the money being borrowed here, with the rest feeling like tacked-on expenditures. You decide.<br />
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<b>SF Prop B</b> - Waterfront height limit planning - <b>No</b><br />
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See our <a href="http://sf-reason.blogspot.com/2013/11/2013-endorsements.html" target="_blank">Prop B and C statement</a> from last November. This year's proposal would call on the electorate to approve any construction over standard height limits along the Embarcadero. We were against ballot box planning last year, and we're against it now.<br />
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<b>Debaters only</b><br />
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Did you know that Nancy Pelosi is up for re-election this year? Well, how would you when she has no campaign events, no public fundraisers, not even an election web site. As of this writing, she hasn't even bothered to ask for your vote in a <a href="https://twitter.com/NancyPelosi" target="_blank">tweet</a>! And of course, it has been years since she has participated in a debate.<br />
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It's this last point that gets us. As we've <a href="http://sf-reason.blogspot.com/2012/11/2012-endorsements.html" target="_blank">mentioned before</a>, we think politicians owe it to their constituents and to democracy in general to engage in debates. We refuse to vote for any non-debating politicians and encourage you do do the same.<br />
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<b>Wednesday morning update: the results</b><br />
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Prop 41 - Yes<br />
Prop 42 - Yes<br />
Prop A - Yes<br />
Prob B - Yes<br />
<br />Brendanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15810877387574644692noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-167237386083437586.post-35404797058131874932013-11-04T11:09:00.001-08:002013-11-06T11:30:40.253-08:002013 EndorsementsYou could be forgiven for not noticing there's an election of sorts in San Francisco on Tuesday. With no accompanying state-wide election and no candidate drama, there's very little to talk about. Nevertheless, we got together to hash out all four SF ballot measures, and here are the results.<br />
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<b>Prop A</b> - Retirement trust fund rules change - <b>Abstain</b><br />
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Years ago, something called the Retiree Heath Care Trust Fund (RHCTF) was set up so that money would be saved now to pay for city pensions in the future. Like new parents setting up a college fund, this is just sound financial management.<br />
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The trust fund has rules for how and when its money is spent. Prop A wants to slightly change those rules. Are you intrigued yet?<br />
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One change would make it harder to take money out, requiring that the deposits for that year had all been paid. Another change would make it easier to take money out now if pension costs for a year are higher than the City anticipated (which they usually are, we hear). Seems like a wash. There are also a number of smaller changes that I won't bore you with.<br />
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Our overarching feeling on this one is: why are we being asked to vote on this? Minutia such as the management of a trust fund should be left to lawyers and elected officials, not the electorate.<br />
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Half of our group abstained and the rest was split. All were <a href="http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=meh" target="_blank">meh</a>. You could either abstain or vote No to express how silly it is that you are being asked to vote on such a thing.<br />
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<b>Props B and C</b> - 8 Washington development and height limit - <b>No</b><br />
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At first glance these two seem practically identical. They authorize a <a href="http://8washington.com/" target="_blank">building project</a> that includes luxury apartments and retail space down on the Embarcadero, wiping out a private tennis club in the process. The main difference is that C simply raises the height limit for an ordinance already approved by the Board of Supervisors while B stands alone.<br />
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We have someone in our group with real estate knowledge, and she points out that Prop B creates a <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special-use_permit" target="_blank">special use district</a>, which is a big pain in the rear for all future permitting there. So if you really wanted to vote for one of these, vote C.<br />
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One thing you hear a lot from the opponents of B and C is that this new development will build a <a href="http://www.nowallonthewaterfront.com/" target="_blank">"wall on the waterfront"</a> because it's even taller then the old <a href="http://www.slate.com/articles/life/transport/features/2010/unbuilt_highways/san_francisco_the_embarcadero_freeway.html" target="_blank">Embarcadero freeway</a> monstrosity. Well it may be twice as tall, but it will be 1/1000th as wide (usually the more important consideration when discussing a wall), so we're going to call BS on that argument. Smells like <a href="https://www.facebook.com/pages/Save-The-Golden-Gateway-Tennis-Swim-Club/" target="_blank">tennis club</a> money.<br />
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But once again our feeling on these is: why are we voting on this? This is why we have a planning commission and elected officials. These decisions should be made in a variety of local hearings, not by the city-wide electorate. Jeesh.<br />
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<b>Prop D</b> - Negotiate drug pricing - <b>Yes</b><br />
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Well, this is just a non-binding statement, but of course anybody making a big purchase should negotiate to bring the price down as much as possible. It's pretty shocking that a <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medicare_Part_D#Criticisms" target="_blank">Bush-era law</a> actually prevents Medicare from negotiating drug prices, resulting in Medicare paying about double what the Department of Veterans Affairs pays.<br />
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So we're not sure why anyone would be against this, and indeed nobody is. Well, almost nobody…<br />
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Our good friend Terence Faulkner is back! His opposition argument is a real gem. It starts with the Roman Empire, drops by Hippocrates, and just keeps on going. He basically argues that pharmaceutical companies are absolutely wonderful and should get as much money as possible. But really, you should read it yourself—pull up the <a href="http://www.sfgov2.org/ftp/uploadedfiles/elections/ElectionsArchives/2013/Nov2013_VIP_Web_EN.pdf" target="_blank">voter guide</a> and scroll to page 71. We love voting against this guy!<br />
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<b>Wednesday morning update: <a href="http://sfelections.org/results/20131105/" target="_blank">the results</a></b><br />
A - Yes<br />
B - No<br />
C - No<br />
D - YesBrendanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15810877387574644692noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-167237386083437586.post-50962344968143891432012-11-05T16:39:00.002-08:002012-11-05T21:19:51.843-08:002012 Endorsements<h3>
SF Reason endorsements for the November 6, 2012 state of California and city of San Francisco election</h3>
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<b>Prop 30</b> - Jerry Brown tax plan - <b>Yes</b></div>
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<b>Prop 38</b> - Munger tax plan - <b>Yes</b></div>
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These are both plans to increase taxes temporarily to make up for budget deficits caused by the ongoing recession. If both of them receive enough votes to pass, whichever has the most votes will come into effect. We really hope at least one does, as the state really needs that money. We're voting for both, but if you're worried that your favored plan is going to lose out, you might vote No or at least abstain on the other.</div>
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Between the two, we favor the Jerry Brown plan (Prop 30), which first and foremost will prevent the "trigger cuts" that have been planted in the current state budget. The trigger cuts will effect K-12 and higher education as well as public safety (police and firefighters). For future budgets, lawmakers will simply have this money at their disposal to budget normally. Prop 30 leans more on the wealthy for its funding than 38, increasing income tax only on people earning over $250k and adding a small bump to California sales tax. </div>
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Prop 38 would not prevent the trigger cuts, although it would actually generate more revenue than Prop 30 by raising income taxes on almost every Californian, with bigger increases for higher earners. The money in Prop 38 is earmarked for K-12 and debt repayment. We're never in favor of attaching strings to tax money and tying the hands of lawmakers (see what I did there?), but this wouldn't significantly impact their ability to shape a budget.</div>
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<b>Prop 31</b> - Local government budgets, state budget procedure - <b>No</b></div>
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Prop 31 has several different components that are only tenuously related, which makes it all the more likely that we won't like something about it. That's exactly what happened. Prop 31 got greedy.</div>
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On one hand, it would force some more fiscal responsibility on the state lawmakers, forcing them to "pay for" any spending increases by identifying new revenue or offsetting cuts. We could be down with that. It also switches the budget to a two-year cycle, which might not be a bad idea given how much trouble legislators have passing budgets.</div>
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Another piece of Prop 31 gives the Governor the power to cut spending at will in a fiscal emergency. Some people find this alarming, but a fiscal emergency is actually defined in the law by specific circumstances, so this doesn't bother us so much.</div>
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What tipped our scales against it was its provision for letting county and local governments come up with their own plans for spending money which (here's the kicker) would have to get approved by the legislature. We think Sacramento already has more on its plate than it can apparently handle and we don't feel like we can saddle lawmakers with even more.</div>
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<b>Prop 32</b> - Limit political contributions from unions, corporations, and government contractors - <b>No</b></div>
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While corporations and unions are prohibited from donating directly to candidates at the federal level, they are apparently free to do so at the state level. Prop 32 would bar them from doing so, although it would not prevent contributions to those fabled Super PACs, which are protected by the US Supreme Court.</div>
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De-politicizing unions and corporations might be something to consider. Many people think of them as the two big players on opposing sides of the vast, corrupt political money game.</div>
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But Prop 32 does not neuter unions and corporations equally. By preventing payroll deductions from being used for political purposes, it kicks unions where it hurts and leaves corporations unscathed. By a show of hands we had no CEOs in our group and at least one union member, but even if we didn't we probably still would have voted No on this.</div>
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<b>Prop 33</b> - Auto insurance discount adjustment - <b>No</b></div>
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Sometimes a more subtle point can be more contentious, and we were split on this one. Prop 33 would change the way a particular auto insurance discount—the continuous coverage discount—would be applied. Currently people who switch companies are treated the same as someone with no insurance at all, neither receiving the discount. Prop 33 would let you retain that discount when you switched. This situation led to two different economic predictions, informing the way individuals in our group voted:</div>
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<b>Theory 1:</b> Giving the switchers a discount would have no impact on the price new auto insurance customers pay, as competition for their business will keep rates at current levels. Permitting the discount to carry over would allow insurance companies to compete for existing customers on a level playing field, leading to lower prices and higher quality service. Vote YES.</div>
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<b>Theory 2:</b> If an insurance company could differentiate between new auto insurance buyers and customers switching from another company, they'd lower the prices for current subscribers to lure them in and gouge new insurers with higher rates to compensate. Rates for new customers would go up, effectively punishing them for not driving. Higher rates for new customers would make people hesitant to drop insurance if they stop driving. The current system keeps the rates for new insurers low. Vote NO.</div>
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3 of us believed in the first theory, while 7 believed in the second, so our overall vote is NO.</div>
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<b>Prop 34</b> - End the death penalty - <b>Yes</b></div>
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We didn't feel any need to rehash all the arguments for and against the <a href="http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/">death penalty</a>. It's not really a new topic and it turns out we're all in favor of stopping it. Typical San Francisco liberals, I know.</div>
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But Prop 34 gets a little greedy! It also mandates that prisoners formerly known as death row inmates will be forced to work in prison and send some of their wages to the victims' families. Some would argue that this is a form of slavery. Some of us don't like how this ecosystem of artificially cheap labor perfectly profits private prison proprietor people and distorts the labor market in general. Was that enough for us to vote against it? Nah.</div>
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<b>Prop 35</b> - Human trafficking - <b>No</b></div>
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Prop 35 expands the definition of human trafficking and brings down some barriers to convicting people of this crime. To be sure, we are not fans of most kinds of trafficking, especially the human variety, but we think this law goes too far. It's wants to punish the bad guys so badly, it doesn't care how much bad it does to non-bad people. Bad.</div>
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You want some controversy? We think prostitution should be legal. That's right, we said it. When it's freely done between consenting adults it does not step on anyone else's rights. Human trafficking is when someone is being forced to perform sex work and obviously that is illegal and should remain so. But Prop 35 will open to door to more aggressive prostitution prosecution. Preposterous.</div>
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You say you want even more controversy? We think the registered sex offender thing has gone too far. A murderer can quietly move to your neighborhood, but a pervert can't? These people have supposedly paid their debt to society. In some cases you have perfectly normal high school kids who ran afoul of archaic statutory rape laws and now can't ever get out from under the sex offender cloud. I bring this up because Prop 35 adds a new way to hassle sex offenders, making them give up all their online account information. No thanks.</div>
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<b>Prop 36</b> - Three strikes reform - <b>Yes</b></div>
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We never really liked California's three strikes law when it was first implemented many moons ago, before most of us could vote. One argument against it has always been that someone could commit a relatively minor crime and, if it happened to be their third strike, would get 25 years to life for it. Prop 36 will correct that, giving repeat offenders a more reasonably scaled-up sentence. Murderers, rapists, and child molesters will continue to get the full three-strikes law. Sounds good to us.</div>
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<b>Prop 37</b> - Label GMO food - <b>Yes</b></div>
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Most countries in Europe require <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GMO_food">GMO</a> (Genetically Modified Organism) food to be labeled. Even China does. Should we?</div>
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Is GMO food safe? Well, so far there is no evidence that it isn't. And of course it's still regulated by the FDA, so it's subject to the same safety precautions that other food is. Some people would argue that even though GMOs have been around for about 20 years and are in virtually every supermarket product not labeled USDA Organic, they should still be treated with caution for fear of yet-undiscovered side effects.</div>
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However, in many ways going organic is a principled, political stance as much as a health issue, and GMOs have a dark political side. Most GMO seed in the US is produced, patented, and litigated by giant agro-chem companies like Monsanto, basically the Halliburton of the food world. I dare you to watch a documentary like <a href="http://trailers.apple.com/trailers/magnolia/foodinc/">Food, Inc.</a> and not be appalled at how they push farmers around through intimidation and litigation.</div>
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Back to the labeling. Some argue that it will raise food prices, but we don't believe that. TV ads decry the exemptions to meat, alcohol, and organics, but we don't have a problem with that. One problem that was mentioned in our group, however, is that GMO labels will become so ubiquitous as to lose all meaning. Sort of like the "chemicals known to the state of California to cause cancer" signs you see everywhere as a result of Prop 65, passed in 1986. While one might argue that there's no harm in a meaningless label, another member of our group argues that "extra labeling is inherently negative."</div>
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Ultimately, though, our group voted 5 to 3 in favor of Prop 37.</div>
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<b>Prop 38</b> - Munger tax plan - <b>Yes</b></div>
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<b>Prop 39</b> - Multi-state corporate tax adjustment, clean energy funding - <b>Yes</b></div>
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Pencils up, accountants. Prop 39 makes a change to the way California determines how much of a multi-state corporation's profits shall be taxed in California. Currently a company can choose to have it calculated by how much of their property and employees are actually in the state, which winds up encouraging them to move jobs out of the Golden State. Prop 39 takes away this option, taxing multi-state companies instead on the percentage of their sales that are in California. Hiring disincentive gone—sounds good to us.</div>
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But then of course Prop 39 has to get greedy. It earmarks the estimated revenue increase for green energy programs and green job training. We like those things, but really don't like earmarks. Well, we still voted Yes.</div>
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<b>Prop 40</b> - Keep citizen-drawn districts - <b>Yes</b></div>
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This was an easy one. We were all for Prop 11 in 2008 which created a commission to draw district lines, a job previously done by the majority in the state legislature, often with hilarious results due to the excessive gerrymandering. In 2010 we enthusiastically supported Prop 20 which applied those districts to congressional elections.</div>
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Well, the results are in, and you can even see the maps in your voter guide. Due to action by the California Supreme Court, Prop 40 isn't really necessary to push these new districts into law, but what the heck, vote for it anyway.</div>
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<b>Prop A</b> - City College parcel tax - <b>Yes</b></div>
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SF City College has lost $53 million in state funding over the last three years and Prop A hopes to plug the hole by creating a $79 parcel tax for eight years. One could argue that a parcel tax is not really the most ideal way to raise money because it taxes a small house the same as a mansion, for example. One of our members didn't like that it was going after property owners (although theoretically the cost will get passed to renters as well). But really, $79 is chump change compared to all the other taxes and costs associates with owning a property and the benefits are definitely flowing in the right direction. All but one of us voted yes.</div>
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<b>Prop B</b> - Parks bond - <b>No</b></div>
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If you've gotten one of these emails before, you might notice something about us: we don't like bonds. Or at least we don't like it when bonds are used inappropriately. Bonds are often described as "having no fiscal impact," seemingly forgetting that the thing will have to be paid back in the future, plus interest.</div>
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Here is an example of a bond we would vote for: build a new park. It's a one-time cost with a benefit that stretches over many years, so paying for it over several years is reasonable.</div>
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Here's a bond we would not vote for: borrow money to do routine maintenance on a park, which is an ongoing expense and should be incorporated into the regular budget. Oh wait, I just described Prop B.</div>
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We love parks and we want money to be spent on them, but not with a bond. Find money in the budget or raise taxes instead.</div>
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<b>Prop C</b> - Affordable housing trust fund - <b>Split</b></div>
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This would earmark tens of millions of dollars each year for the next 12 years to be used for affordable housing purposes. This action is largely in response to cutbacks in federal money we were getting for the same kinds of programs. We're not exactly pleased with how SF has implemented affordable housing, but many of us see its importance. Many of us also don't like earmarks, especially ones like this that only grab money from the city's budget without adding a new source of revenue.</div>
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So we split evenly down the middle on this one. Sorry readers, you're on your own this time.</div>
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<b>Prop D</b> - Election consolidation - <b>Yes</b></div>
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San Francisco elects a few key city offices to four year terms, but staggers them two years apart. On one hand, some may think that splitting the elections up makes us focus on each race more. Others think they'd be more likely to pay attention if they were all done in same year, which is what Prop D would do.</div>
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We were not strongly for or against this one, but wound up just barely voting Yes. What probably tipped the scales was general agreement that consolidating the elections would save some money.</div>
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<b>Prop E</b> - Gross receipts tax - <b>Yes</b></div>
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This may remind you of Prop 39 above. San Francisco currently taxes companies based on their payroll, not on their sales. So if you have a start-up, you pay tax on every employee even if you're not actually making any money yet. This is a disincentive for job creation in SF, so we're down to switch the tax over to gross receipts and encourage more hiring in The City.</div>
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<b>Prop F</b> - Hetch Hetchy study - <b>No</b></div>
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When Hetch Hetchy Valley was <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hetch_Hetchy_Reservoir">dammed up</a> back in 1923, John Muir wept. Or pounded his fist on a table. Or cursed for the first time in his life. OK, we don't actually know what his exact reaction was, but he didn't like it and had fought to prevent it from happening. Prop F would allow a study to be funded (up to $8 million) to investigate ways to return Hetch Hetchy to nature as well as write down a plan for water recycling and other ways for SF to use water better.</div>
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That sounds great, but we're feeling kind of strapped for cash right now. Also, we don't think there's going to be a reasonable alternative to Hetch Hetchy. Finally, even John Muir had to admit that the valley was seldom visited even when it was dry. Maybe we'll go on a camping trip out there, sleep beside the reservoir, and contemplate this more, but for now our answer is No.</div>
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<b>Prop G</b> - Oppose corporate personhood - <b>Yes</b></div>
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This is a non-binding statement expressing the City's disapproval of the <i><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citizens_United_v._Federal_Election_Commission">Supreme Court's decision in Citizens United v. the Federal Election Commission,</a></i> which opened the door for unlimited corporate political contributions via Super PACs. Mark it yes, dude. Although kind of reminds me of a line from <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=q7vtWB4owdE#t=130s">Animal House</a>…</div>
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<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<b>Otter:</b> I think this situation absolutely requires a really futile and stupid gesture be done on somebody's part. </blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<b>Bluto:</b> We're just the guys to do it.</blockquote>
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<b>Nancy Pelosi and Dianne Feinstein - Debaters only</b></div>
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We generally don't comment on candidates, but once again we want to say something about San Francisco's representatives who are running for re-election. Everyone knows that Pelosi and Feinstein are shoo-ins, including the candidates themselves who have not done any active campaigning. Nancy Pelosi doesn't even have an election website, and both have refused to <a href="http://www.sfgate.com/opinion/editorials/article/Debates-incumbent-on-Stark-Feinstein-3897310.php">debate</a>.</div>
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This non-debating really bothers us. The only time an elected official can truly be made to defend their positions is when debating their opponent. We don't think of debating as simply a way to gain advantage over a challenger; it's also an important way to communicate with constituents, which is part of their job. As Matt Gonzalez <a href="http://www.fogcityjournal.com/wordpress/2409/gonzalez-pens-open-letter-to-pelosi/">wrote</a> in an open letter to Pelosi two years ago, "A democratic society cannot flourish or long endure if our elected representatives avoid articulating and defending their views, or otherwise subjecting their political beliefs to public scrutiny."</div>
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And there are many reasons to scrutinize them. San Francisco is known as being ultra-liberal, but Pelosi seldom represents those views in Congress. Her Republican opponent, John Dennis, points out that she voted for a bill to allow American citizens to be detained indefinitely without trial. She also voted for wars in Iraq and Afghanistan while her city was staging protests against them. Even if you are a fan of Pelosi's, wouldn't you like to hear her defend these choices?</div>
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So that is why we are encouraging people not to vote for Pelosi or Feinstein. Vote for their opponent or maybe just abstain. We want to start sending a message that our votes are not going to be given freely, but have to be earned.</div>
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Brendanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15810877387574644692noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-167237386083437586.post-79032881362475236952011-11-08T08:46:00.000-08:002012-11-05T21:01:20.143-08:002011 Endorsements<h3>
Email sent with endorsements for the November 8, 2011 San Francisco city elections</h3>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: monospace;">Dear fellow SF voters,<br /><br />To those of you who I just added to this list, let me explain: each year some friends and I sit down and grind through all the things being voted on and come up with our recommendations. We try to go in with open minds and research, debate, and make jokes about the various candidates and ballot measures. It takes quite a while - we go through it so that maybe you won't have to. Or have another opinion in case you were looking for one.<br /><br />I'm also attaching a little candidate cheat sheet that I put together. I can tell you that this research was pretty mind-numbing as they all say they will create jobs, fix Muni, improve the schools, blah blah blah. So what I did is try to list each candidate's top 3-5 issues in the order that they talk about them most, plus list anything that was atypical. For Sheriff I thought it best to just give a résumé. There's also endorsement lists and links to their websites if you want to learn more.<br /><br />Anyway, here's our results, with explanations following:<br /><br />A: No<br />B: No<br />C: Yes<br />D: Yes<br />E: Yes<br />F: No<br />G: Yes<br />H: No<br /><br /><br />Mayor<br /><br />1: Jeff Adachi<br />2: John Avalos<br />3: Dennis Herrera<br /><br /><br />District Attorney<br /><br />1: David Onek<br />2: Sharmin Bock<br />3: Vu Trinh or Bill Fazio<br /><br /><br />Sheriff<br /><br />1: Ross Mirkarimi<br />2: Paul Miyamoto<br />3: David Wong<br /><br /><br /><br />Prop A: $531 million school bond - No<br /><br />We were torn on this one. On one hand, of course we want schools to be in good shape. But on the other hand, we really don't think a bond is the way to do it. Let me explain:<br /><br />Government should take out a bond when it's doing a big one-time thing like building a highway. Something where it makes sense to spread the payment out over years because you will be getting years of benefit from it. Something that is so beneficial that every year you delay having it is benefit lost.<br /><br />What bonds should definitely NOT be used for is the type of thing that needs to be maintained every year like, say, roads (see Prop B). Building maintenance is in that vein. We know politicians would much rather float these bonds than raise taxes or cut something else, but that's really what they have to do.<br /><br />Oh, and remember that by the time you pay off a bond, you've spent about twice as much on it than it you paid for it up front. And you've paid that money to people who are bond investors, i.e. more wealthy than not. (That's right, we're a bunch of progressive hipsters.) No, we much prefer that taxes are raised so that more money comes from rich people instead of going to them.<br /><br />Anyway, that's why we voted No on this. Although it gave us no pleasure to deny the kids anything.<br /><br /><br /><br />Prop B: $248 million road bond - No<br /><br />Read the discussion for Prop B. We think roads are a great example of the kind of thing that should never be paid for with a bond. Politicians, grow a pair and make us pay for the services we demand.<br /><br /><br /><br />Prop C and D: Pension reform - Yes and Yes<br /><br />We've done this before: taken two opposing propositions and voted for both of them, even though their supporters say we should say yes to one and no to the other.<br /><br />First of all, we give props to Jeff Adachi for bringing pension reform to the forefront. Even if Prop C beats Prop D, he still wins in our book.<br /><br />Both Prop C and D are steps toward relieving the city of an unsustainable pension burden. There is still more deficit to make up, but these are steps in the right direction. Prop D goes a little further than Prop C ($1.7 billion vs $1.3 billion over 10 years), which is not surprising considering that Prop C was made in cooperation with police and fire unions. It's also not surprising that Prop C somewhat protects police and fire from the pension reforms, while throwing every other city worker under the bus (even bus drivers, ironically). We like that Prop D protests the lowest paid city workers (under $50k) from pension changes.<br /><br />Then again, some claim that Prop D will get brought down in court if it wins, but we've heard that scare tactic before. We're going to vote for both and see what happens.<br /><br /><br /><br />Prop E: Amending voter-approved legislation - Yes<br /><br />Initially, this seemed like it was giving the Board of Supervisors too much power, letting them take away laws that the public had voted on. We agreed that after a long time (especially after the board had completely turned over) it didn't seem so bad.<br /><br />But then we found out that Prop E will not apply to any laws that have been passed previously and will only apply to measures that the board themselves placed on the ballot. Sounds pretty reasonable to us.<br /><br />But what REALLY makes us like voting for this is that our old election-pamphlet nemesis, Terence Faulkner, is against it. We love voting opposite him.<br /><br /><br /><br />Prop F: Redefine campaign consultant - No<br /><br />This law would re-define what constitutes a campaign consultant and have them report their activities more often. OK.<br /><br />But then if this law passes, apparently the board of supervisors will be free to change the definition in the future without voter approval. So I guess that's bad.<br /><br />We were on the fence, but then noticed that for some reason nobody had bothered to file any paid arguments in favor of this proposition. I guess they just don't care.<br /><br /><br /><br />Prop G: Maintain current sales tax - Yes<br /><br />If California sales tax drops because some law expires, this would bump the total tax back up and the money would go to the city. The money is earmarked for police, fire, nurses - you know, the usual suspects. We don't like earmarking, but are convinced that sending this money to them would let the city give them a little less from the rest of the budget.<br /><br />Yes, sales tax isn't just a tax on the wealthy, it also taxes the rest of us poor iPhone-toting schlubs. But last I checked a new Maserati cost even more, so the rich will still be paying more. Yes.<br /><br /><br /><br />Prop H: Local school assignment - No<br /><br />We were somewhat split on this one. The progressives in us are all for giving opportunity to people living in disadvantaged neighborhoods, and Prop H would be a step against that.<br /><br />But we also noted the plight of an average San Francisco resident that wanted to put their kid into a school and found out they had to go to one of the "bad" schools. Yes, they are paying an expensive mortgage to live in a good neighborhood, but under the current system they might not get to send their kid to their local "good" school. That would probably be pretty frustrating.<br /><br />Really, instead of sending their kid to the "bad" school, they would probably opt out, sending him/her to private school if possible or maybe deciding not to live here in the first place. Is that going to help the school system - losing those students from a more, shall we say, stable background?<br /><br />Finally, it really bothered me personally that we just accept that we run some schools that suck and will always suck. Someone needs to get all Jeff Adachi on this issue.<br /><br />Anyway, the group voted, and the group voted No.<br /><br /><br /><br />Mayor<br /><br />1: Jeff Adachi<br />2: John Avalos<br />3: Dennis Herrera<br /><br /><br />One thing you have to understand about us is that we tend to be progressive. The other thing is that we really don't like the Willie Brown/Gavin Newsom lineage. And since Ed Lee is part of that lineage, we aren't voting for him.<br /><br />Here's another thing about Ed Lee: he has admitted that the reason he decided to run after promising he wouldn't is that he "couldn't resist Willie Brown and Rose Pak." Well, if he couldn't resist their influence to go through the election process, what do you think are the chances that he could resist doing them any number of political favors while in office? He'd be a puppet. We like him because he seems like a nice guy, but maybe he's too nice....to them.<br /><br />What sets Jeff Adachi apart from the other candidates is this pension reform thing. He saw a problem and he took action. He doesn't seem full of ambition to us. If you read all the candidate statements, they all make the same age-old promises: fix Muni, create jobs, yadda yadda. But only Adachi has taken an issue and really made it happen. And yes, he wants to fix Muni too.<br /><br /><br />District Attorney<br /><br />1: David Onek<br />2: Sharmin Bock<br />3: Vu Trinh or Bill Fazio<br /><br /><br />We simply liked David Onek's positions slightly more than the other candidates, but the other names listed here would also do well for us.<br /><br />We did not want George Gascon because he's part of the Brown/Newsom political machine. Also, we dont' think he has any business being DA, given his previous career in law enforcement and relative lack of experience in the courtroom.<br /><br /><br /><br />Sheriff<br /><br />1: Ross Mirkarimi<br />2: Paul Miyamoto<br />3: David Wong<br /><br /><br />What do Sheriffs do around here, anyway? Oh, they run the jail. And a list of other things.<br /><br />In this race, Paul Miyamoto and David Wong are Sheriff deputies who are working their way up the system. We respect that. On the other hand, Ross Mirkarimi is more of a civilian, although he does have experience with law enforcement.<br /><br />So do you want an insider our an outsider for Sheriff? Well, retiring Sheriff Mike Hennessey apparently did a good enough job that he was there for decades, and he was an outsider. He also hand-picked Ross to replace him for that reason. We're convinced.</span>Brendanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15810877387574644692noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-167237386083437586.post-4024565430271107432010-10-25T15:49:00.000-07:002012-11-05T21:10:31.725-08:00November 2010 Endorsements<h3>
Email sent with endorsements for the November 2, 2010 state of California and city of San Francisco elections</h3>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: monospace;">Dear Friends,<br /><br />For the past few years, a few of us have gotten together before an upcoming election to go through all the various items on the ballot, research them, discuss them, make jokes about them in hopes of being better informed on election day. Then we email our results to you in case you don't have the time or inclination to go through the same process on your own (it took us over 2 hours).<br /><br />This time we had 6 participants: Gabrielle, Jenny, Jon Tracy, Eric (OE), Jeff (Evil) and Brendan (Big Guy, Mr. B).<br /><br /><br />Results (non-unanimous decisions marked with *):<br /><br />California State:<br /><br />Prop 19: Yes<br />Prop 20: Yes<br />Prop 21: No*<br />Prop 22: No<br />Prop 23: No<br />Prop 24: Yes*<br />Prop 25: Yes<br />Prop 26: No<br />Prop 27: No<br /><br /><br />San Francisco:<br /><br />Prop AA: Yes<br />Prop A: No<br />Prop B: Yes<br />Prop C: Yes<br />Prop D: Yes<br />Prop E: Yes<br />Prop F: Abstain*<br />Prop G: Yes<br />Prop H: No<br />Prop I: Yes<br />Prop J: No<br />Prop K: Yes<br />Prop L: Yes*<br />Prop M: Yes*<br />Prop N: No*<br /><br /><br /><br />Prop 19 - Legalize Marijuana - Yes<br /><br />It probably comes as no surprise that a bunch of San Francisco residents between 25 and 35 years old are in favor of legalizing marijuana (not that we've ever smoked it before because that would be illegal (except when Jeff was in Amsterdam)).<br /><br />We were interested in hearing some arguments against it, but have yet to find a single one that holds up. Here's an example: in the voter guide Dianne Feinstein claims, "If Proposition 19 passes, the worker with marijuana in his or her system may not be removed from the job until after an accident occurs." But the actual text of Prop 19 (Sec. 11304(c)) says "the existing right of an employer to address consumption that actually impairs job performance shall not be effected." Nice try, Senator.<br /><br />I'm not sure if the opponents of Prop 19 have actually read it, but we have. And we find any ambiguous claims of it being "poorly written" to be without merit. Search and replace pot with booze, and you land right at the our current, accepted, functioning alcohol law.<br /><br />We, like many people, think marijuana and alcohol should be treated identically. Likewise, the similarities between alcohol prohibition in the 1920s and marijuana prohibition today are striking. We don't know what will happen as Prop 19 is in direct contention with federal law, but think it's time to take it to court.<br /><br /><br />Prop 20 - Redistricting - Yes<br /><br />We were big fans of Prop 11 back in 2008, which tries to kill the practice of gerrymandering by creating a commission to draw district lines, consisting of one third Democrat, one third Republican, and one third independent. We think that sounds incredibly fair, and would like to apply it to Congressional elections with Prop 20.<br /><br />The only arguments against are from incumbent Democrats and their supporters who enjoy their majority in the state legislature and the power to gerrymander that comes with it. We haven't heard any principled arguments against it, so easy for us to vote yes.<br /><br /><br /><br />Prop 21 - Vehicle license fee to fund State Parks - No*<br /><br />We were pretty evenly split on this one: 2 for, 3 against, 1 abstain. And nobody was very strongly for, strongly against, or...um...strongly not voting.<br /><br />One one hand, $18 per year is pretty modest, and it funds state parks which were in danger of closing down this year as the budget tightened. We love state parks (especially Mt. Tam).<br /><br />On the other hand, part of the reason California is in such a mess is that we have all these stupid Propositions that bind the hands of our elected officials. We don't want to add another.<br /><br />What killed it for some of us was that Prop 21 would take away the ability for state parks to charge entry fees to people who had paid the surcharges, but entry fees seem to be to most fair way to collect money.<br /><br /><br /><br />Prop 22 - Protect local funds from legislators - No<br /><br />Another proposition to prevent state legislators from directing money where it's needed, tying their hands. It's already bad enough.<br /><br />Also, this seems to simply be a battle between various public sector unions, voting based on whether they will be the beneficiaries of the protected money. Leave us out of it.<br /><br /><br /><br />Prop 23 - Suspension greenhouse gas law AB 32 - No<br /><br />We were proud when California fought the Bush administration for the right to have higher environmental standards. No way do we want to undo them, even temporarily.<br /><br /><br /><br />Prop 24 - Close business loopholes - Yes*<br /><br />4 of 6 of this in favor of this one, but could have gone either way. Prop 24 takes away some accounting tricks that businesses can use to pay less taxes. They didn't seem to be anything totally outlandish though, and California already has a reputation of being unfriendly to business.<br /><br />OE didn't like it because once again it represents the electorate meddling with policies that are generally set by the legislature.<br /><br /><br /><br />Prop 25 - 50% to pass a budget - Yes<br /><br />The current two-thirds requirement is one of the biggest hurdles to us having a functional legislature. We are stoked to get rid of it.<br /><br /><br /><br />Prop 26 - 2/3 majority to increase fees - No<br /><br />Didn't you read what we just said for Prop 25? Two-thirds means fees will never be raised, even when it's necessary. Let the legislature do its job.<br /><br /><br /><br />Prop 27 - Un-Redistricting - No<br /><br />As we said before in Prop 20, we're anti-gerrymandering, so we're anti-this.<br /><br /><br /><br /><br />Prop AA - Vehicle registration fee to pay for roads - Yes<br /><br />This fee is just $10 a year, and it goes to pay for roads and transit, which sounds good to us.<br /><br />What really tipped the scales is that the opponent in the voter guy is none other than Terence Faulkner, a crazy guy from the last election pamphlet. If he's the only one against it, then it sounds pretty good.<br /><br /><br /><br />Prop A - Earthquake Bond - No<br /><br />We primarily don't like Prop A because we don't like bonds. This one is looking for $46 million, but the SF budget is $6.5 billion and is running an annual deficit of $450 million. If they want to set aside $46 million, they should be able to do it with the money they've got.<br /><br />Also, this bond is to help the owners of private buildings. Can't they go to the bank?<br /><br />We vote no. The one thing that kills us is that we're actually voting with Terence Faulkner on this one. Arrrgh!<br /><br /><br /><br />Prop B - Pension reform - Yes<br /><br />A very controversial issue here in SF, but we're all for it. The few level heads around City Hall can see that our current pension deal is just not sustainable and has to be changed. It's not about politics so much as accounting.<br /><br />And we couldn't help notice that some of the city workers are ridiculously over-paid. This basically amounts to a pay cut, and we think it's well-deserved. A lot of people are out of work right now, so the city workers might want to count their blessings.<br /><br /><br /><br />Prop C - Mayoral Question Time - Yes<br /><br />Why wouldn't the mayor want to talk to the board of supervisors once a month? Maybe because it distracts him from campaigning for Lieutenant Governor.<br /><br />It's really too bad it's come to this, but if we really have to force our Mayor to act civilly every once in a while, so be it.<br /><br /><br /><br />Prop D - Non-citizens vote for school board - Yes<br /><br />There are many non-citizens that are here legally and pay taxes and have kids in our schools, so they deserve some representation to go along with that taxation. Such voting policy was apparently common in the US (and other countries) until some anti-immigrant hysteria in the 1920s had us circle the wagons.<br /><br />Oh, and Terence Faulkner is his ALL-CAPS glory is against it. Put us down for yes.<br /><br /><br /><br />Prop E - Same-day voter registration - Yes<br /><br />Initially some of us were against this one until we talked it out. For one thing, we actually had someone in our midst (Jon Tracy) who would benefit from same-day voter registration.<br /><br />Registering to vote seems so fundamental to democracy, it's hard to believe it could be politicized. But it is. Most of us register when a someone is paid by one of the two big parties to register people at a targeted location. But if it happens to be a non-presidential year (like this one) and you just moved here (like Jon Tracy) you could easily miss the chance.<br /><br />Registering at the polls is the most un-partisan way to do it, and the way they're proposing to do it makes sense. Too bad it will only count at the city level.<br /><br /><br /><br />Prop F - Health Service Board - Abstain*<br /><br />This makes a small change to the way the Health Service Board (who???) gets elected. Total savings could be a whopping $30k.<br /><br />Most of us (4 out of 6) were annoyed at even being bothered with such a lame administrative detail, so we will be abstaining to show our contempt.<br /><br /><br /><br />Prop G - Transit operator wages - Yes<br /><br />We don't know how transit operators got their insanely generous wage provision into the city charter (by law they have the 2nd highest pay of any American city), but we want it out. How can the city negotiate with a union that has their salary guaranteed?<br /><br /><br /><br />Prop H - Elected officials on political party committees - No<br /><br />Gavin Newsom thinks that people involved in other areas of politics could be influenced in their city jobs. Well, what would you know about that, Mr. Mayor-Campaigning-For-State-Office? I just laughed out loud: in his arguments, Newsom writes, "Serving as an elected official is a serious commitment." This from the guy is hoping to quit his job Sarah Palin style.<br /><br />Why wouldn't elected officials be involved with their parties? Especially third parties where there aren't that many officials to go around. Apparently this is aimed at some specific people Newsom doesn't like.<br /><br /><br /><br />Prop I - Saturday voting - Yes<br /><br />This is a one-time experiment, and we like experiments (typical science nerds). Here's a fictional conversation we had with the people involved:<br /><br />Alex Tourk: "Why do we vote on Tuesday at all? It's a relic from the farming days."<br />US: "Good point!"<br />Terence Faulkner: "I'M AGIN IT!"<br />US: "Sweet, then we're definitely for it."<br />Alex Tourk: "Gavin Newsom was my pal, then he slept with my wife."<br />US: "Mother F#@$%^ Newsom!"<br /><br /><br /><br />Prop J - Increase hotel taxes, close resident loophole - No<br />Prop K - Close loophole only - Yes<br /><br />We like the idea of closing this tax loophole, but think hotels already have enough taxes associated with them. No need to bleed our visitors further.<br /><br /><br /><br />Prop L - Sit/Lie ordinance - Yes*<br />Prop M - Police beat patrol - Yes*<br /><br />We were somewhat split, but the majority of us chose to vote in an unconventional way for these. The sponsors of the measures want you to vote for just their Prop and against the other one, but they're not the boss of us.<br /><br />Sit/Lie lets the police charge someone for sitting or lying on any San Francisco sidewalk from 7am to 11pm. Its aim is to give the police an extra tool to make life unpleasant for the various panhandlers and troublemakers on Haight street. Sounds good to those of us that live there.<br /><br />On the other hand, the simple act of sitting on a sidewalk (if you're not blocking the foot traffic) really isn't the problem. Non-panhandlers could sit on most of the streets in the city and not even be noticed, and the street thugs can be just annoying while they stand. There are already laws on the books that prohibit the behavior we're really bothered by - aggressive panhandling, threats, etc.<br /><br />So to be OK with Prop L, we really have to trust that the police will enforce it the way we want it, not arrest us if we ever touched butt to pavement. Well, the SF police have earned our trust over the years, so we're willing to give them this tool. For whatever reason the current law isn't working and we're ready to give this a try.<br /><br />Most of us also like Prop M, which would mandate more cops walking the streets instead of driving around in cars. OE prefers to let the police (which we trust) figure out the best way to organize themselves and not meddle in it, but those of us living in the Haight see very few cops on foot and plenty in cars, despite the fact that there is a station just a couple blocks away. We would like to see more cops on foot, which seems like a great way to deal with the problem, in many ways better than Prop L. If Prop M gets more votes than L, it will kill L.<br /><br />So the majority of us are actually voting for both, hoping that at least one will pass.<br /><br /><br /><br />Prop N - Higher property transfer tax - No*<br /><br />This would raise a tax paid when very expensive properties were sold, mostly be commercial buildings, plus a very small number of SF houses that exceed the $5 million dollar limit.<br /><br />We weren't strongly for or against this. The amount it hopes to raise is small compared to the city's deficit. As the tax is only applied when a property is sold, we don't think it will have any impact on rents or office leases.<br /><br />In the end 5 of our 6 decided against it, based on the fact that we have doubled this tax just recently, exceeding most major American cities. Also, why are they making us vote on it?<br /><br /><br /><br />[Wow, I can't believe you read all the way down here. One more thing:]<br /><br /><br />Nancy Pelosi - You Decide<br /><br />Three of the six of us wanted to say something about Nancy Pelosi, even though we usually don't comment about candidates.<br /><br />What we wanted to say is that we don't think Pelosi really represents us, and has no connection to her constituents. She takes her re-election for granted, even though her policies aren't quite in sync with ultra-liberal San Francisco voters. Even if you are a fan of hers, you will not be getting any opportunity to hear her speak, or listen to her debate the moderate Republican that's challenging her, John Dennis. Even though she is facing re-election, she has no campaign website up and no campaign materials printed. She actually has a smaller jurisdiction than our absentee Mayor, but even he has been spotted at San Francisco events from time to time.<br /><br />Given that the polls indicate she is indeed a shoo-in, three of us wanted to encourage people to make a statement by voting for someone other than Pelosi, sending the message that she needs to stop taking her constituents for granted.<br /><br />Matt Gonzalez says it better than us:<br /><br /><a href="http://www.fogcityjournal.com/wordpress/2409/gonzalez-pens-open-letter-to-pelosi/">http://www.fogcityjournal.com/wordpress/2409/gonzalez-pens-open-letter-to-pelosi/</a></span>Brendanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15810877387574644692noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-167237386083437586.post-45022233373527633362010-06-07T11:54:00.000-07:002012-11-05T20:54:42.680-08:00June 2010 Endorsements<h3>
Email with endorsements for the June 8, 2010 California and San Francisco primary elections</h3>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: monospace;">In what is becoming a tradition, a few of us went through the various San Francisco and California ballot initiatives last night so that the rest of you don't have to. The participants were Jeff Hamilton (aka Evil), Brendan Bolles (Big Guy, Mr. B), Eric Anderson (OE), David Hornung (SM), and Katie Hornung (Katie). This time we found the issues to be pretty straight forward and there was very little dissent (Measure D had a little). Read below for commentary.<br /><br />Summary:<br /><br />California<br />13: Yes<br />14: No<br />15: Yes<br />16: NO!<br />17: No<br /><br />San Francisco<br />Yes on everything A-G<br /><br /><br />13: Seismic retrofits will not increase property taxes: Yes<br /><br />If you have a house and add that home theater and slip-n-slide bowling alley you've always wanted, the house will be reassessed and your property taxes will increase. But this will also happen if you make it more earthquake safe, so some people are hesitant to go forward with such work. This measure takes away this disincentive and has our extremely competent (ahem) legislature determining exactly what falls within the bounds of a seismic retrofit. Sounds good.<br /><br /><br />14: Opener Open Primary: No<br /><br />This one is actually a little tricky - it lets everyone in California vote for every candidate in the primary, regardless of party affiliation, and then the top two vote getters will be on the final ballot in November. Sounds pretty good so far. In theory you could have a November election between two popular Democrats or maybe two popular Republicans if the other side didn't bring it. Or maybe there could be some sort of hybrid cyborg candidate with a lot of support on each side who otherwise would get lost in the (Tea) party. So this election reform might allow for those theoretical possibilities, which sounds good.<br /><br />But on the downside, one thing it would surely do is further marginalize third parties, which would basically cease to appear on the November ballot. We didn't like that (particularly Big Guy who is registered Green).<br /><br />Another theoretical scenario: you could also end up in a situation where the Democrats had five strong candidates and the Republicans had only two, but under this system the two Republicans might be the ones that wound up the top two vote getters, punishing the Dems for having a strong field. This system would really strengthen the ability of the two parties to choose their candidate for you by scaring you about throwing the election if you didn't obey.<br /><br />There are plenty of good ways to reform elections so that the people's views are better reflected (ranked-choice voting, for one). We don't think this is a good one.<br /><br /><br />15: California Fair Elections Act: Yes<br /><br />At the federal level, a candidate with enough support can choose to not take any more private campaign money and instead get a set amount from the government. This measure would make the option available for California state elections. We don't like all the money in politics, and public financing could possibly help a lesser known candidate that deserves to be heard. So yeah, we like it.<br /><br /><br />16: PG&E wants to eat your children: NO!<br /><br />Oh, PG&E, you rapscallions. They call this measure the "Taxpayers Right to Vote", because it gives us the right to need a 66% majority to pass any future public power legislation. Well, why not make it 99% - imagine the glorious freedom!<br /><br />Sort of reminds you of Bush's "Healthy Forest Initiative" that would protect forests from fires...by cutting them down.<br /><br />PG&E has been successful before with such tomfoolery, like last time San Francisco talked about getting public power and they ran an expensive campaign convincing the populace it would give government a "Blank Check." Using our utility bill money, no less. And it worked! Pretty please, California, don't fall for this.<br /><br /><br /><br />17: Auto Insurance rule change: No<br /><br />This bill would let an auto insurer look at your insurance history to see if there had been any gaps (like, say, if you didn't own a car for a while) and jack up the price if you did. No thanks. FYI, this devilish scheme is being hatched by Mercury Insurance - hope you aren't using them.<br /><br /><br /><br />A: School Earthquake and Fire retrofit: Yes<br /><br />This proposes increasing property takes by a whopping $32.20 per year to pay to upgrade some schools. That sounds pretty cheap and we're all renters anyway so guess what, we like it.<br /><br />As an aside, there's a great argument against from Dr. Terence Faulkner, JD who says SF students can't find India on the map so they shouldn't get earthquake retrofits. Ummm...<br /><br /><br /><br />B: New emergency response center: Yes<br /><br />Apparently our current emergency command center is in the bottom of a building not considered earthquake safe (the Hall of Justice). It's going to be expensive though: $412 million. The only argument against it that we were presented comes from Chris Daly (we're not a fan) who'd rather the whole building get fixed, not just move this one thing out. Prop B also retrofits other emergency infrastructure and it seems everyone's for it. But given how expensive it will be, we're surprised that only Chris Daly is against.<br /><br /><br /><br />C: Film Commission change: Yes<br /><br />The Film Commission works to bring movies to our city, which brings in some money, as well as publicity that brings in tourists and their precious, precious money. Currently, all 11 members are appointed by the mayor. With this measure, 5 of them would be appointed by the board of supervisors. We like power to be distributed, so sign us up.<br /><br />First interesting tidbit: apparently the SF Chronicle has a crush on Gavin Newsom, because they side with the mayor's office on every issue, including this one.<br /><br />Second interesting tidbit: crazy lawyer Terence Faulkner makes his second appearance here, arguing, "Should the influence of the Board of Supervisors increase on the Film Commission, it is likely that the business interests of the City and County will be neglected in favor of more lunches, dinners and cocktail parties. Free meals and cocktail parties are major City Hall perks." Oh, Terence.<br /><br /><br /><br />D: City Pension changes: Yes (mostly)<br /><br />The first thing this Proposition changes is a little controversial - it forces city employees to pay their own money into their pension instead of the city. So basically it's a pay cut. But most of us think SF city employees are overpaid, so giving them a pay cut is fine by us. David wasn't so sure he liked pensions being monkeyed with, himself being a government employee.<br /><br />The other thing this changes is how pension payouts are calculated, closing a widely-known loophole used by city employees right before retirement. Cool beans.<br /><br />Surprisingly, even though this seems to effect a lot of unionized city employees, none of them could be bothered to submit an argument against it in the voter guide.<br /><br /><br /><br />E: Security budget transparency: Yes<br /><br />Gavin Newsom feels very insecure. So he demands a security force be around him at all times. He even had them travel to his wedding in Montana (they drove his hi-tech city-supplied SUV while he rode with another officer in a private jet) and then they followed them to his Honeymoon in Hawaii. Mayoral security sounds like a great job, right? They also followed him all during his campaign for governor, and San Francisco paid the bill.<br /><br />Well all that sounds pretty expensive, but the neither the mayor nor the cops will tell us how much. Prop E will force them to tell us, that's it.<br /><br />We're not sure the Mayor of this town needs too much security anyway. We noted that the one Mayor who had an incident (Moscone) was actually shot by a member of the board of supervisors and Newsom's entourage wouldn't have mattered. And BTW, the Secret Service discloses its presidential protection budget.<br /><br /><br /><br />F: Renter's hardship: Yes<br /><br />This Prop would give a way for a tenant to prevent their rent from going up temporarily when they lost their job or got a 20% pay cut. On one hand, renters in this town hardly need more protection, but then again the tenant will have to apply for this exemption and a judge will evaluate if they are really suffering based on their assets, bank account, etc., so we think it will only be helping people who actually need it.<br /><br /><br /><br />G: Transbay Terminal: Yes<br /><br />California already voted to build a high-speed train between SF and LA, to be completed approximately 3 lifetimes from now. The plans were originally to have it end at the existing Transbay Terminal, but some people want to build another station for it. This Prop re-affirms that the Transbay Terminal will be used, which makes the most sense to us.<br /><br />It sort of kills us that the guy writing the voter guide opinion in favor is Chris Daly, but we agree with this measure anyway.<br /><br />Another entertaining argument against accompanied this Prop. Eve Del Castello is against it because the decrepit Transbay Terminal is a "landmark", high speed rail is "unsafe", and I-5 is "fun". Haha, good one, Eve.</span>Brendanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15810877387574644692noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-167237386083437586.post-6726706136447920862008-11-03T15:57:00.000-08:002012-11-05T21:11:19.134-08:002008 Endorsements<h3>
Email with endorsements for the November 4, 2008 California state and San Francisco city election</h3>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: monospace;">Myself, OE, Evil, and Chudi sat down for a few hours and examined the various ballot initiatives in SF and the state. In case anyone is interested, here's what we came up with (with further discussion below).<br /><br />We took into account what was written in the voter guides, endorsements by the Chronicle and Guardian, and then decided for ourselves. If someone couldn't decide either way, they sometimes went with a coin toss.<br /><br />Our designation for each was weather we were "fur it" or "agin it". Decisions were unanimous (at least within a coin toss) unless otherwise specified.<br /><br /><br />State Propositions<br /><br />1A: Fur (3-1)<br />2: split (2-2)<br />3: Agin<br />4: Agin<br />5: Fur<br />6: Agin<br />7: Agin<br />8: Agin<br />9: Agin<br />10: Agin<br />11: Fur<br />12: Agin (3-1)<br /><br /><br />SF City Propositions<br /><br />A: Fur<br />B: Agin (3-1)<br />C: Fur<br />D: Fur<br />E: Fur<br />F: Agin<br />G: Fur<br />H: Fur<br />I: Fur<br />J: Fur<br />K: Fur<br />L: Agin<br />M: Agin<br />N: Fur<br />O: split (w/ coin toss)<br />P: Agin<br />Q: Fur<br /><br /><br />Prop 1A: High-speed rail bond<br /><br />This bill is going to be very expensive. The bond is for $9 billion, but we know the cost of these projects can't be predicted and they tend to go way over budget. Expense and questioning the usefulness of taking a train to LA only to need to rent a car to get anything done down there we reasons cited against it. Ultimately though, OE, Chudi, and Big Guy decided we wanted the country to have a rail infrastructure and were willing to spend what it takes to put it there (or at least take the first step).<br /><br /><br />Prop 2: Animal protections<br /><br />As meat eaters, we were each personally divided on this one. For certain animals (you know, the cute ones we have as pets), we already provide protections against cruelty. Saying that a farm animal should have enough room to at least stretch their limbs out doesn't seem to be asking for much. But then it would raise food costs and we're still planning to slaughter them anyway. We thought maybe we would work personally to uphold this standard for the food we buy if not have the state mandate it. (FYI, Ira Glass visited a chicken farm, decided that chickens were as unique/conscious/whatever as dogs and cats, and then became a vegetarian. Something to think about.)<br /><br /><br />Prop 4: Parental notification for abortion<br /><br />We acknowledge that teens should be in contact with their parents before getting an abortion and believe clinics do everything they can to encourage these kids to do so. They are not cheering for the kids to get a secret abortion. It is interesting to note, also, that nearly any other medical procedure you'd get does required parental consent for under-age kids. But then we thought that requiring the consent would lead to late-term/illegal abortions or babies being left in dumpsters. We'd rather have them get it done right away before (in our opinion) the moral, legal, and practical consequences get sticky.<br /><br /><br />Prop 6: Prison spending<br /><br />We decided this was yet another "tough on crime" bill that seeks to further increase the prison population. We want less people in prison, especially for nonviolent crimes (we're in favor of Prop 5 for this reason).<br /><br /><br />Prop 7: Renewable energy<br /><br />While sounding good on the surface, we decided this bill was mainly a corporate grab, especially by some rich dude in Arizona who has a lot of natural gas. Heck, it's a renewable energy bill that even the Green Party is against. What does that tell you?<br /><br /><br />Prop 9: Victims present at parole hearings<br /><br />If you want a hearing to be an objective look at the law, the last person you'd want there is a member of the victim's family. We want rational thinking people to decide if a criminal has repaid his debt to society.<br /><br /><br />Prop 10: Alternative fuel vehicles<br /><br />(see Prop 7)<br /><br /><br />Prop 11: Redistricting commission<br /><br />We love this bill. Gerrymandering is one of the key ways members of Congress prevent there from being a real contest in an election. Some of those districts are ridiculous. Big Guy likes that it will help third parties.<br /><br /><br />Prob B: Affordable housing fund<br /><br />We were torn on this one. We would love for teachers, nurses, and other underpaid people to have a place to live in SF. But we weren't sure this would actually give them that. In general, we're not a big fan of public housing in this city, it seems to put the residents into a lower class, divide them from the rest of us. At the same time, we like helping people out.<br /><br /><br />Prop F: Mayoral election in even numbered years<br /><br />The last election was boring, pretty much a coronation for Newsom. But the one before it was very interesting and it would have been a shame to lose it in the noise of state/federal elections. Having the election on odd numbered years costs more, but gives more attention to our local government race. It's worth the price.<br /><br /><br />Prop H: Clean energy act<br /><br />When we started getting a ton of no-on-H mail, we knew there was a big corporation trying to knock it down. Indeed, PG&E is funding the opposition, with the support of corporate-friendly politicians like Newsom. Prop H calls for evaluating other ways of getting power, including possibly creating our own municipal utility district. 900 cities in the US have done this, and the ones we know about all seem pretty happy with it. I don't know of anyone thinking it was a mistake and wanting to go back to PG&E. The Prop H opponents say it's a "blank check" because the SF board of supervisors would be able to get bonds without voter approval. But the board can ALREADY do this for many other city tasks, such as the Public Utility Commission, which provides us with our water. So naturally, if electricity becomes a public utility, it will get the same treatment. And at least the board is accountable to the people for money it spends, while PG&E isn't.<br /><br />Not to mention, one of the main goals in Prop H is to get SF using renewable energy faster than anyone else. PG&E is going to miss the state-mandated goals because they have no real consequences if people can't jump ship.<br /><br />Unfortunately, while we are all for Prop H, we think that the millions of dollars PG&E is spending (money from our own electric bills) will probably win out. Thanks to the propaganda, we ourselves were largely against Prop H until we looked at it carefully.<br /><br /><br />Prop J: Historic Preservation Commission<br /><br />Currently the Mayor appoints a group of people to handle this. This would give the Board of Supervisors ability to approve/deny potential members. Sounds good to us. Plus, the opponents couldn't even be bothered to write a paragraph on why they oppose it in the voter guide.<br /><br /><br />Prop K: Decriminalize sex work<br /><br />Yeah, we don't think prostitution should be a crime. Because we're crazy left-wing pinko commies I guess.<br /><br /><br />Prom M: Protect tenants against harassment<br /><br />Renters in SF already have it pretty good in terms of legal protection. This Prop doesn't seem to outlaw anything that isn't already outlawed. In theory, us renters should be in favor of this, but we didn't think it was necessary.<br /><br /><br />Prop P: Transportation Authority Changes<br /><br />Newsom is always putting his buddies in charge of Muni, paying them a lot, and then steering the money however he likes. He's trying to do it again. Amazingly, even the pro-Newsom supervisors are against this one. Try to find someone fur it. Not us.<br /><br /><br />Prop R: Rename Sewage Plane for Dubya<br /><br />We think this is a funny idea and we have always been pro-humor. We don't think the employees will take offense to it.<br /><br /><br />Prop U: Defund the Iraq war<br /><br />Nancy Pelosi isn't too concerned with the opinion of her constituency. San Francisco is totally against the war, but she has pushed forward every war appropriations bill since she became Speaker. So much for "No more blank check." If she doesn't hear us, maybe she'll hear this.<br /><br /><br />Prop V: Bring back JROTC<br /><br />We're certainly not pro-military. Then again, we know that there is some need for it. But that doesn't matter here, because hardly any of the kids who do this go on to the military. Teachers and parents say it's a great after school program. Who are we to disagree?</span>Brendanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15810877387574644692noreply@blogger.com0