A

At issue was Proposition B, approved by San Diego voters in 2012 by a nearly 2-to-1 margin. The measure required that all city employees who began their jobs on or after Jan. 1, 2013 – except for police officers – get 401(k)-style retirement benefits instead of the defined benefit pensions that left San Diego finances in near ruins more than a decade ago because of City Council decisions to underfund them.

But San Diego employee unions and the California Public Employees Relations Board (PERB) argued even before the measure reached the ballot that it violated state collective bargaining laws because the campaign for the pension changes was led in 2011 and 2012 by then-San Diego Mayor Jerry Sanders. He claimed that his role in the Prop. B campaign was as a private citizen – not as mayor – and thus he faced no obligation to collectively bargain with public employee unions before touting the direct-democracy initiative.

Before reaching the state high court, a trial judge first disagreed with Sanders and San Diego, then an appellate court sided with the city. But all seven state justices joined in a ruling that found that city leaders had not met their requirement to first seek changes at the bargaining table before seeking to impose them through direct democracy.

“Allowing public officials to purposefully evade the meet-and-confer requirements of [state collective bargaining rules] by officially sponsoring a citizens’ initiative would seriously undermine the policies served by the statute: fostering full communication between public employers and employees, as well as improving personnel management and employer-employee relations,” the court held. It ordered the case be sent back to the appellate court to determine how San Diego should untangle its mess.

Elected leaders may be less likely to lead ballot fights

The decision seems likely to change the nature of direct democracy going forward – at least at the local level of California government.

Direct democracy, brought forward in California by Gov. Hiram Johnson in 1911, has greatly benefited from the active participation of elected officials. They are often more able to win public approval of sweeping reforms through the ballot box than they can through the Legislature or city or county governing boards, which are often allied with deep-pockets special interests.

For example, Earl Warren – the former U.S. Supreme Court chief justice and California governor – repeatedly led ballot campaigns as Alameda County district attorney that directly affected many areas of California life.

But similar efforts by a politician in 2018 would face a different kind of vetting than Warren faced. Going forward, any ballot proposal that affects public employees in any way is subject to a potential court veto if it can be established that it were led by elected officials who didn’t live up to their collective bargaining obligations.

The California PERB Blog’s analysis noted that justices “did leave open the possibility that government officials can separate their official actions from their private activities. However, the court did not provide any guidance on what a government official would have to do to make such a distinction clear.”

November ballot fills out with 17 measures…

Good morning, happy Friday and welcome to July!

Voters have been warned for a while to be prepared for a seemingly never-ending series of ballot measures, and on Thursday the secretary of state released the final list of what initiatives qualified.

Seventeen total. And while voters will read and learn more as the campaigns unfold between now and Election Day, we put together a quick reference guide for your reading and learning pleasure.

The guide includes an increased tobacco tax, a repeal of the death penalty, a sped-up death penalty process, gun control, Legislature transparency, plastic-bag ban referendum, and so much more.

CalWatchog has more. 

In other news:

• Lawmakers can still get measures on the November ballot, which one senator is hoping to do with a $3 billion bond for low-income housing. The Los Angeles Times has more. 
• The Legislature sent 12 gun-control bills to Gov. Jerry Brown today, where it’s unclear how many he’ll sign. But we’ll know shortly as he’s headed out on vacation afterwards. The Sacramento Bee has more. 
• The state’s controversial vaccination law takes effect today, and it’s causing some people to move away, writes The San Jose Mercury News. 
• The San Bernardino County Sun explains why CA regulators want more money to improve air quality.

Assembly:

• Gone ’til August.

Senate: 

• Gone ’til August.

Gov. Brown:

• Headed for a European vacation.

Tips: matt@calwatchdog.com

Follow us: @calwatchdog @mflemingterp

New followers: @michaelkapp @ethnicphysician

Is Issa really in trouble?

Is Congressman Darrell Issa really in trouble after squeaking through the primary election earlier this month?

Just two and a half years after being on top of the political world, Issa is in one of the toughest political fights of his 15-year career, according to his hometown paper, after advancing to the general election with just 51.5 percent of the vote.

Political handicappers have downgraded his race from Safe Republican to Likely Republican and Republican’s voter registration advantage in the district has dipped with the rise of Trump (who Issa endorsed).

But Issa’s camp isn’t worried, noting that while the race was close, it still ended with Issa on top — a forecast of what’s to come.

“While the election night number was what it was, I think a longer look at the whole story shows that we withstood — rather than were walloped by — the registration surge, heavy Dem turnout and no competitive GOP race,” said Issa spokesman Jonathan Wilcox.

CalWatchdog has more. 

In other news:

• About that Trump endorsement: At an event in San Diego yesterday, Issa said he’d like to have a “re-do” of the entire primary process where Trump wasn’t the nominee. The San Diego Union-Tribune has more. 

• The Dalai Lama brought a message of peace to Sacramento on Monday, telling lawmakers: “The best way to take care of one’s self is to take care of others.” The Los Angeles Times has more. 

• Even though they haven’t officially qualified for the November ballot yet, 10 would-be initiatives are stockpiling money and preparing for war. The Sacramento Bee has more. 

• “California lawmakers are putting the finishing touches on a plan to provide up to $2 billion to help cities build permanent shelters to get mentally ill people off the street,” writes the AP/Capital Public Radio.

Assembly:

• Full slate of committee hearings. 

Senate:

• Full slate of committee hearings.

Gov. Brown: 

• No public events scheduled.

Tips: matt@calwatchdog.com

Follow us: @calwatchdog @mflemingterp

New followers: @grahamdude @nwconservative

With a rush to place measures on the ballot because of low signature requirements to qualify a measure, cheaper costs to file an initiative (a minor factor), and, especially, the lure of higher turnouts during a presidential election with all initiatives now legally bound for the November election rather than the June primary, the initiative process has become catnip for policy entrepreneurs and special interests.

Consider what the voters could be facing in November via the initiative process:

• Increasing the minimum wage to $15 an hour.
• Legalizing marijuana.
• Deciding whether to eliminate the death penalty altogether or speed up the process so that those receiving a death penalty would not linger so long before the sentence is carried out. There are two competing measures filed.
• Banning one-time use plastic bags (a referendum that has already qualified) and perhaps requiring paper bag fees to end up in an environmental fund (a bit of revenge against the grocers that supported the plastic bag ban and reap the payments on paper sacks).
• Bar state agencies from paying more for prescription drugs than the lowest price paid by the federal Department of Veteran Affairs, which typically negotiates the best bulk rates from drug companies.
• New gun control measures, especially background checks for ammo purchase.
• $9 billion in state bonds for school construction.
• A requirement that all revenue bonds of $2 billion or more receive a vote of the people, designed we are told by observers, to undercut Gov. Brown’s Delta Tunnels plan.

As appears in many advertisements, this is only a partial list.

Then there are the many tax measures:

• A 230 percent increase in cigarette taxes adding $2 a pack.
• A continuation of the Proposition 30 taxes of 2012 on upper-income earners that was originally passed as temporary. There are two different measures dedicated to that purpose.
• A tax increase on property valued at $3 million and more to fund poverty programs.

While the legislators’ role in big policy decisions this year might be diminished in light of a ballot full of propositions, let’s not forget that elected officials can and will play prominent roles in various initiative campaigns.

Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom has embraced marijuana legalization, the minimum wage and background checks on ammunition purchases. You would expect Newsom to husband his money for his coming gubernatorial campaign so his role would be that as a spokesman and advocate and, perhaps, fundraiser.

Not so with Gov. Jerry Brown. He’s already hinted that the $20-plus million sitting in his political account could be used in ballot battles. A prime consideration would be the defeat of the revenue bond vote requirement that could scuttle some of Brown’s big plans.

When all is said and done by the end of this year, it appears likely voters will serve as the legislators making big policy decisions.

Editors Note: The American Progressive Bag Alliance sponsored a media dinner hosted by Calwatchdog to discuss and debate the plastic bag ban with journalists in Southern California.

The notion is both sickening and unconstitutional, but it’s also part of California’s political process dating back to 1911. The Golden State is one of 24 states that use the initiative process.

The issue arises as several other groups in the past month have submitted paperwork to the state Attorney General’s office to get the ball rolling on a wide range of ballot measures. After the paperwork is signed, supporters must collect 365,000 signatures to put their issue before voters.

There are currently 33 measures filed with the AG for the 2016 ballot.

The state’s largest service employees union, the SEIU, submitted a request to the state AG’s office in late April for a measure that would boost the minimum wage statewide to $15 an hour by the year 2021.

Another group seeks to curtail the state’s often-generous alimony law.

Then there’s the aforementioned “Sodomite Suppression Act.”

The latter effort has put the state’s system of proposition-as-change in the national spotlight. State Attorney General Kamala Harris is seeking more time to figure out how to refuse the measure without violating the rights of the gay-killing advocate, who lists his name as Matthew McLaughlin.

Most scholars say Harris can’t halt it; the law allows even something as unconstitutional as murder to be put to a vote.

Every election year, “a lot of people will come up with an initiative idea and throw it into the system, and you have a lot of crackpots,” said Kenneth Miller, associate professor of government at Claremont McKenna College, who developed the Miller-Rose Institute Initiative Database of all statewide initiatives approved by voters through 2014.

“Most of the things that succeed are done by interest groups, trade association, labor unions, business groups,” Miller said.  “Usually not individuals at large.”

Among states using the ballot to enact statewide policy change, California voters are second only to Oregon in the number of measures approved, 121.

California voters have passed around 35 percent of measures since 1911, when the state approved the initiative process.

Many times these initiatives stem from a group or individuals who are sure that the state Assembly will never pass legislation to address their issue or grievance. Unless otherwise worded, propositions can only be undone by another voter-approved initiative or a legal challenge.

“Most states that use this approach to lawmaking were the western states, which at the time were a lot more politically fluid,” Miller said. “They were just starting to become states and didn’t have entrenched systems.”

Challenges to initiatives

A passed initiative doesn’t mean unchallenged, and California has by far the most challenges to voter decided propositions, with 78 percent being taken on post-passage, according to an analysis of data by CalWatchdog.com.

Since the ‘70s, around half of those challenges have been at least partially successful.

By far the most challenges have come to “Jessica’s Law,” approved with 71 percent of the 2006 vote. The law prohibited all sex offenders from living within 2,000 feet of schools and parks, with the goal of keeping them away from children. Nine legal objections have been made. It has so far survived, but one case led to a state Supreme Court ruling in March that it went too far and made it unconstitutionally difficult for convicts to find a place to live.

Its legacy continues to be cited; this session, eight bills cite the proposition in supporting various amendments to the law it created.

The second most frequently challenged proposition, from 1920, allowed non-citizens the right to own property. It was approved by 75 percent of voters. Of the five challenges, three failed, one succeeded in part and the other got rid of the measure’s effect altogether.

The most recent legal challenge to a proposition came regarding 2012’s Prop. 35, which passed with 81 percent of the vote, the highest margin ever for a state proposal. It provided for stringent penalties for human traffickers, though a camp in opposition contended that it peripherally targeted sex workers.

A federal court halted implementation of the measure, and last month the court prolonged the stay until September.

Legal foes, including the ACLU of Northern California, say they will seek a permanent injunction against the voter-approved law if legislation addressing the measure isn’t approved by September.

Prop. 213 in 1996 was approved by 77 percent of the voters and restricted lawsuits by uninsured motorists and drunk drivers. That measure was challenged twice in state court and upheld.

“Crackpots” not going anywhere

The “crackpots” pushing homicidal notions like sodomite suppression will probably be around for some time. Polls indicate California residents feel they are better at lawmaking than their elected officials.

Miller said that doesn’t seem to impede legislative efforts to alter or clarify the process.

Assembly Bill 535, introduced in February, seeks to create more specific language for initiatives. Assembly Bill 1457 would make a minor housekeeping change to a legal provision governing people collecting signatures for an initiative petition.

“You can imagine that state lawmakers would like to maintain a monopoly on lawmaking and not open it up to outsiders,” Miller said.

Added John Matsusaka, executive director of the Initiative and Referendum Institute and the University of Southern California: “Why some states allow the initiative and others do not, that is something of a mystery. Legislators usually dislike the initiative, so the puzzle is how so many states managed to adopt the process in the first place, given that it usually took a first action by the legislature.”

Steve Miller can be reached at 517-775-9952 and avalanche50@hotmail.com. His website is www.Avalanche50.com

Competing alternatives

Legislators have advanced two different proposals, differing largely in how much regulatory control they leave to local government. The plan put forward by Assemblyman Ken Cooley, D-Rancho Cordova, would task both state and city governments with licensing dispensaries and marijuana farms, the Los Angeles Times noted. Another bill, authored by Assemblyman Rob Bonta, D-Oakland, “would divide regulation tasks among multiple state agencies.”

Different constituencies have begun to line up in favor of one or the other option. “Law enforcement officials prefer the Cooley bill because it gives local governments more control,” reported the Times, while the California Cannabis Industry Association has come down against Cooley’s bill.

Mainstreaming marijuana

Despite the disagreement and broader regulatory confusion — federal law banning the sale of marijuana has not changed — Californians have continued to press ahead for looser rules. Public opinion and public policy have converged steadily toward a greater normalization of marijuana users, if not always marijuana itself. This month, for instance, an overwhelming majority of Assembly lawmakers passed AB 258, The Medical Cannabis Organ Transplant Act, introduced by Marc Levine, D-San Rafael.

According to the bill’s language, “[a] hospital, physician and surgeon, procurement organization, or other person shall not determine the ultimate recipient of an anatomical gift based solely upon a potential recipient’s status as a qualified patient…or based solely on a positive test for the use of medical marijuana by a potential recipient who is a qualified patient.”

In the Senate, meanwhile, state Sen. Mike McGuire, D-Healdsburg, has introduced SB 643, the Medical Marijuana Public Safety and Environmental Protection Act. That bill would use a mix of state and local regulation to address the environmental impact of marijuana cultivation.

As the Guardian observed, McGuire “says illegal grows are deforesting government lands, polluting waterways and affecting the health of those who use medical marijuana. One provision of his bill requires all cannabis to be certified organic by 2022, to eliminate polluted runoff into state waterways and make marijuana safer to use,” while another would crack down on “the illegal use of water to irrigate cannabis crops.”

Industry investment

Underscoring the economic interest at stake in statewide legalization, one popular dispensary app recently spent $1 million on its own initiative-driven organization. As the Sacramento Bee reported, “Irvine-based Weedmaps Media, LLC, which runs Weedmaps.com, put the money into the company-sponsored ‘Californians for Sensible Reform’ to support a possible 2016 initiative.”

Although details on that proposed measure have yet to emerge, the Bee noted, two others have advanced on the strength of more concrete reforms.

One, the California Craft Cannabis Act, “would create a California Cannabis Commission to regulate the industry. Marijuana sales would be subject to all applicable taxes, with additional taxes allowed up to 30 percent. Larger-scale, commercial grows would be subject to additional rules and tax regulation. The law also would preempt any local marijuana restrictions.”

Another, put forward by Californians for Compassionate and Sensible Access, focused more narrowly on local preemption.

Local schemes

With the path to reform in 2016 still so unclear, cities with a marijuana agenda of their own have forged ahead with ideas confined to the municipal level. In San Francisco, Supervisor Scott Wiener and Terrance Alan, the Entertainment Commissioner turned marijuana activist, have joined to propose that the Board of Supervisors create a city-specific Cannabis State Legalization Task Force.

“There’s a reasonable chance that next November the voters will legalize recreational cannabis use in California. The last thing we need in San Francisco is to have a chaotic fire drill about local implementation and so forth,” Weiner told Smell the Truth. For the foreseeable future, San Franciscans won’t be alone in that regard.

Only a third of those eligible to cast ballots did so on Nov. 4. “Of those who registered to vote, little better than four in every 10 – about 42 percent – actually voted, either in person or by mail,” according to the California Secretary of State. Even more important, the total votes cast for governor, which determines the numerical hurdle signature-gatherers must clear to get their initiative on the ballot, hit a quarter-century low. The San Francisco Chronicle reported:

“In California, the number of signatures required to qualify a measure for the ballot is a percentage of the total votes cast for governor. Since the 42 percent turnout on Nov. 4 meant only about 7.3 million people bothered to take a side in Gov. Jerry Brown’s landslide win over Republican Neel Kashkari, the bar for qualifying ballot measures in 2016 will be at the lowest level in at least 25 years.

“The change isn’t a tiny one. Since the last governor’s election in 2010, it has taken 504,760 valid signatures to put a standard initiative on the ballot and 807,615 signatures for a constitutional amendment. Once the November election is certified Friday, those numbers will drop to about 366,000 and 586,000, respectively.”

A host of initiative hopefuls has already begun to plan for a big 2016, including public employee unions and taxpayers rights’ groups. But attention will focus most strongly around two high-profile efforts that have failed in the past, but enjoy the support of powerful backers: marijuana legalization and the breakup of California into six smaller states.

Hemp hopes

As Reason magazine observed, advocates of marijuana legalization and regulation have picked up steam in recent years, thanks to voter support. Alaska, Colorado, Oregon, Washington and the District of Columbia all have given pot the green light; emboldened, activists have turned for 2016 to Maine and Massachusetts in the East and Montana, Arizona and California — the biggest prize — in the West.

Along with proposals to fly the California flag at the same height as the U.S. flag, and to require the use of condoms in pornographic video performances, the marijuana legalization initiative has already been publicly proposed, but not yet made official with the Attorney General’s office.

Pot advocates hope to use 2016’s low bar to land on the ballot in a well-publicized but cost-effective way. In 2010, voters rejected a legalization initiative; this year, advocates see themselves catching a nationwide wave in favor of looser drug laws — and capitalizing on recent changes to California criminal law that treat inmates convicted on drug charges more leniently.

Six Californias 2.0

Venture capitalist Tim Draper, meanwhile, hasn’t given up his own hopes for an up or down vote on his Six Californias proposal. That idea, ridiculed in many corners of the press but viewed favorably by those seeking to shake up dysfunctional state governance, didn’t make it onto the ballot last time around. It would break up the state into six new states.

“Draper put about $5 million of his own money into gathering some 1.13 million signatures for ‘Six Californians,’ only to have the California Secretary of State’s office rule that just 752,000 were valid,” the Chronicle reported. “That was not enough to make the 807,000 required this year to make the cut.” In an interview with the Chronicle, Draper chose his words carefully:

“’We’re going for 2016, and we have 750,000 signatures, but they say we have to start all over again,’ he said Tuesday. ‘It’s a kind of Catch 22.’

“Asked if he will re-launch the signature-gathering process in light of the new 2016 lower bar, Draper said, ‘We want Six Californias to happen. We’ll see.’

“’This is a mission critical for the state,’ he said. ‘I live here and so does most of my family,’ and more than ever, he said, ‘we’re saying wait a second: we can make this change.’”

That’s an attitude typical of those who struggle to land initiatives on the statewide ballot. For them all, 2016 offers a once-in-a-generation chance to do so.

One of the last — and perhaps most effective — ways for conservatives and Republicans to influence state politics is through the ballot initiative system. Currently, four ballot initiatives have already earned their place on the November 2014 general election ballot:

California Rainy Day Budget Stabilization Fund Act: Put on the ballot by the Legislature, if passed the initiative would force the Legislature to put 3 percent of revenue into the rainy day fund.

There’s one major exception: If revenues fall — i.e., if taxes fall or the economy takes a hit — then the state doesn’t have to save money for the rainy day fund. It’s difficult to say definitively whether or not the bill will work, because it’s hard to predict future revenues. However, the bill limits spending by requiring unexpected revenue to be put in the rainy day fund. 

Without a clear mandate, typically the Legislature keeps little or nothing in reserve. This year, lawmakers set aside $1.1 billion for a rainy day fund as part of a deal with Gov. Jerry Brown, who urged the Democratic Legislature to show some level of fiscal restraint. If this initiative had been in effect, the Legislature would have had to set aside about three times that amount.

California Water Bond: This is another proposition referred by the state Legislature. It was supposed to appear on the June 2012 ballot, but it was postponed by the Legislature to the November 2014 ballot. It allows the state government to borrow more than $11 billion to refurbish the state’s water system. While not a “hot-button” issue like pot legalization, the bill will have a huge impact on the state’s finances, as the state already has a total bond debt of almost $90 billion.

California Insurance Companies Required to Justify Their Rates to the Public Initiative: In short, the proposition would let the state regulate health insurance companies as it already does car and homeowner insurance companies. The state insurance commissioner would have to approve rate changes, among other new regulations of insurance companies.

California Referendum to Overturn Indian Gaming Compacts: The initiative concerns Assembly Bill 277, a compact between California and the Wiyot Tribe and the North Fork Rancheria of Mono Indians. The compact allows for Native Americans to build a large new casino off Highway 99. A yes vote allows them to; a no vote overturns the compact and prevents the new casino complex from being built.

Circulating

While only four initiatives have been approved for the ballot, 19 have been approved for circulation (to seek the signatures they’ll need for approval). Among those, several touch on hot-button issues, such as:

Public assistance benefits reform: The law creates several new requirements for people seeking public assistance — from presenting identification to requiring certain people to seek employment for three months before accessing assistance. The Legislative Analyst estimated that the initiative could save the state a net hundreds of millions of dollars per year.

Parental notification for abortion: It would require a medical professional who is performing an abortion to notify a minor’s parents at least 48 hours before the procedure (in writing). Three similar initiatives appeared on the ballot in the past and failed. The last measure, in 2008, failed by 52-48.

Additionally, two other initiatives would roll back laws passed by the Legislature that expanded the availability of abortion by allowing less qualified medical professionals to perform abortions and changing the standards for abortion providers.

Drug tests of doctors: The proposition would require doctors in California to undergo drug tests (and have the results of those tests forwarded to the California Medical Board). Doctors also would be required to inform authorities of other doctors whom they believe may be using drugs.

Legalizing marijuana: The perennial effort to decriminalize marijuana use is back. And this time, it may actually have a shot at passing, as both Washington state and Colorado have legalized the drug since California’s Proposition 19 failed 54-46 in 2010. Medical marijuana has been legal in California since 1996, when voters approved Proposition 215.

It’s too early to tell which propositions will pass — or how much money supporters of each will be able to raise. But for voters who feel underrepresented statewide, it’s a good place to try feeling heard.

By John Seiler

I noted earlier that anti-government protests have erupted in Brazil against their crummy government. Now the protests are spreading. The latest, as reported in the New YorkTimes:

“More than a million protesters marched in the streets late Thursday, according to Brazilian news reports, in the biggest demonstrations yet, and President Dilma Rousseff on Friday called an emergency meeting of her top Cabinet members.”

The Brazilian Obama should resign.

“The mass protests thundering across Brazil have swept up an impassioned array of grievances — costly stadiums, corrupt politicians, high taxes and shoddy schools — and spread to more than 100 cities on Thursday night, the most to date, with increasing ferocity.”

Sounds like America today, especially California.

“All of a sudden, a country that was once viewed as a stellar example of a rising, democratic power finds itself upended by an amorphous, leaderless popular uprising with one unifying theme: an angry, and sometimes violent, rejection of politics as usual.

“Much like the Occupy movement in the United States, the anticorruption protests that shook India in recent years, the demonstrations over the cost of living in Israel or the fury in European nations like Greece, the demonstrators in Brazil are fed up with traditional political structures, challenging the governing party and the opposition alike. And their demands are so diffuse that they have left Brazil’s leaders confounded as to how to satisfy them.”

Actually, a better example than the Occupy movement would the the Tea Party, which the Times doesn’t even mention at all. The Tea Party, contrary to some myths of it being started by the billionaire Koch Bros., in fact was a spontaneous uprising sparked by Ron Paul’s December 2007 “Money Bomb” on the Internet. Paul even called it a reenactment of the Boston Tea Party. Thousands of local groups took it from there. (And in fact, Paul and the Kochs are opposing factions in the libertarian movement.)

Moroever, like the Brazilians, and unlike the Occupy movement, the Tea Partiers oppose the sky high taxes that are bleeding us dry to pad the pockets of lazy government workers and Crony Capitalists who can manipulate the system.

Also, as we have learned the past two months, it was the Tea Partiers, not the Occupy movement, who were the targets of the Stasi-level attacks by the wicked IRS under Obama, which ensured his rigged re-election. Not that Romney would have been better. But opposition to Obama, led by the Tea Partiers, never was allowed to get off the ground because the IRS mercilessly harassed them.

As with my previous post on Brazil, I’m going to end with a YouTube of the great Sergio Mendes and Brasil 66.

And here’s a snappy salute to Brazilians. Let’s hope they lead us all in revolt against repressive governments.

By Wayne Lusvardi

A proposed ballot proposition circulating for signatures in California for what is called a “spilt tax roll” is dead on arrival at the ballot box in November 2012 should it gather the necessary 807,614 signatures. (See Item 1560 — Initiatives Cleared for Circulation, California Secretary of State).

A split tax roll in California would reassess commercial properties every three years, while residential properties would be reassessed only upon resale, as currently provided by Proposition 13.

The reason why splitting residential and commercial property tax assessments is toast?  New data from the U.S. Department of Commerce show California property taxes have increased about 45 percent since mid-2008, while median home values have declined about 19.5 percent over that same period of time.  Houses are worth less, but property taxes have gone up anyway.

Median Home Price & Property Taxes Collected — California

There is no apparent need to split the property tax roll in California. The real estate market and the circuit breakers of Prop. 13 have already done it.

It apparently is not that commercial properties are not bearing their fair share of the property tax load, or are exploiting tax loopholes, as anti-Prop 13 tax advocates contend.  Rather, it is that aggregate single-family home prices are receding and thus not carrying their share of the property-tax burden.  Clobbering an already overburdened commercial property tax base composed of 97 percent small businesses with more frequent tax re-assessments is not a viable solution to the state budget deficit.

This trend of increasing property taxes and falling home values is nationwide, but is worst in California.  Despite home prices falling off a proverbial cliff in California since 2008, property tax collections have increased by 45 percent.

In other words, the median home price in California has fallen by 5.6 percent per year since 2008, but property tax collections have risen by 9.8 percent per year over the same time frame on a compounded basis.

Prop 13 is not to blame for the continuing state budget deficit.

Home prices can’t recover because rising property taxes are consuming much of the expendable household income.

Claiming that commercial properties are not bearing their fair share of the property tax load is deceptive.  It is residential home values, and thus, the residential property tax base that is declining instead. Any proposal to split residential and commercial property tax re-assessments is dead on arrival at the ballot box come November.