Here’s one significant loser in the current California budget crisis: the power of the ballot initiative.
California is the only state where, under the constitution, a law or amendment enacted by ballot initiative may not be altered without another vote of the people. That gives the state the most powerful initiative process in the world. But it turns out that an international financial crisis, coupled with a anticipated budget shortfall of more than $40 billion, can put a crimp in that power.
In their desperation, legislators of both parties are attacking initiative power. This week’s proposal by Democratic legislative leaders, Senate President Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg and Assembly Speaker Karen Bass, is not merely an attempt to avoid the state’s two-thirds requirement for raising taxes. It really may set up an end run around Prop 13, which established that two-thirds requirement. If the gambit works (and it says here that it makes good political sense), the legislation could be challenged in court. And it’s quite possible that a judge could create a loophole around Prop 13’s two-thirds rule.
Republicans are objecting that the legislature isn’t honoring the will of the people. But their own budget proposal makes clear that their respect for the will of the people is limited. They want to raid funds approved by the voters via initiative for early childhood programs (Prop 10), after-school programs (via Schwarzenegger’s Prop 49), and mental health (Prop 63).
Democrats object to taking money from these programs they value, and note the will of the people. But as they go after Prop 13, they don’t have much of a leg to stand on either. In fact, you may recall Prop 63 was sponsored by none other than… wait for it… Darrell Steinberg.
Oh, cruel, twisted irony.
In truth, for all the talk about the will of the people, the budget crisis reveals a bipartisan disdain for voter-approved projects. Legislators have waited so long to make cuts and raise taxes that this week, infrastructure projects were frozen, including spending authorized by voters as part of a big package of bonds in 2006. And both parties have been willing to raid Prop 42 transportation funds as well.
That said, I have sympathy for the lawmakers in this regard. As my colleague Mark Paul, senior scholar at the New America Foundation, often points out, the ballot initiative creates all sorts of spending mandates outside the budget approved by lawmakers. The result is there are two budgets in California: the one adopted by the legislature and signed by the governor, and the budget that we have after voters add on more spending. One factor in the crisis is the difficulty of reconciling those two budgets.
What’s apparent is that we can’t have a truly balanced budget without initiative reform. And that means that people will have to give up some of their initiative power–in particular, the right to approve new spending with a simple majority. We should make it harder to qualify and approve ballot initiatives. In return, we should make it easier for voters to pass judgment on the work of lawmakers by making easier to qualify referenda for the ballot.