After 30 Years, A Budget Reform That Will Work
The most important difference between Proposition 1A – the budget reform measure on May’s special election ballot – and the numerous attempts to control spending or enforce balanced budgets that have preceded it: Proposition 1A might actually work.
California ballots and, indeed, the Constitution itself, are strewn with well-intentioned efforts to impose discipline on state elected officials. But each of these measures has failed because it either frustrated public demands to provide more resources for priority needs, such as transportation or education, or was never designed to work as advertised in the first place.
This is no small thing. It makes no sense to propose or adopt a tough measure to impose fiscal discipline if it won’t be adopted, doesn’t work, or cannot pass the test of time. But that’s been the track record over the past thirty years:
Threat of Gas Station Closures Is No Joke
April 1st is best known for April Fools jokes…and while I wish the topic of this editorial was also a joke, unfortunately it is not.
At the beginning of next month, The California Air Resources Board (CARB) is set to impose regulations that threaten to close more than 6,000 gas stations statewide – which will result in increased gas prices, higher unemployment, dirtier air, and will seriously jeopardize $3 billion in gas tax revenues that our State needs for vital services.
Several years ago CARB adopted regulations requiring gas stations to install new equipment to reduce air pollution levels – something many of us strongly support and agree needs to be done.
However, due to bureaucratic delays, high fees, and onerous regulations, only 1 in 5 gas stations statewide have so far been able to comply.
Roger Rabbit and Me
Judge Doom: Eight lanes of shimmering cement running from here to Pasadena. Smooth, safe, fast. Traffic jams will be a thing of the past.
Valiant: So that’s why you killed Acme and Maroon – for this freeway? I don’t get it.
Doom: (smugly) Of course not. You lack vision. I see a place where people get on and off the freeway. On and off. Off and on. All day, all night. Soon, where Toontown once stood will be a string of gas stations, inexpensive motels, restaurants that serve rapidly-prepared food, tire salons, automobile dealerships, and wonderful, wonderful billboards reaching as far as the eye can see. My God, it’ll be beautiful.