Backers of a new state Constitutional Convention have apparently decided that California’s voters can’t be trusted to decide what’s best for the state.
After nearly a year of pitching a convention as a chance for grassroots Californians to make the hard choices politicians won’t, the Bay Area Council has decided those average citizens shouldn’t have a chance to discuss whether the state needs more taxes.
“There are a whole bunch of reforms we can get to without touching tax increases,’’ John Grubb, a spokesman for the council, told the Capitol Weekly Monday.
In a convention, hundreds of people from across the state would get together to discuss ways to reform state government, hopefully coming up with solutions that would bring California’s government into the 21st century.
Any proposals coming out of that convention would have to go on the statewide ballot for approval by the voters before they could take effect.
While that sounds good in theory, the possibility that a majority of California voters just might decide the state needs more money to improve its schools, fix its decaying infrastructure and maintain a decent safety net for its citizens sent the Bay Area Council running for cover.
Their proposed language for the initiative needed to call a Constitutional Convention reportedly says that the delegates “shall be prohibited from considering” any revisions that would affect either the property tax portions of Prop. 13 or “any other direct increases in taxes.”
Ever since Prop. 13 passed in 1978, it’s been the third rail of California politics: touch it and die a political death. And every poll for the past 31 years has said that people don’t want anyone meddling with the provisions that have kept homeowners from being forced from their homes by soaring property taxes.
It’s easy to argue that by taking the most popular parts of Prop. 13 off the table, it becomes a lot easier to pass the initiative for the convention, since it disarms many of the complaints of senior groups and anti-tax organizations.
The Bay Area Council’s involvement makes that argument a little bit hinky, however, especially since the council has worked to position itself as an even-handed spokesman for Californians who are mad as hell about the direction the state has taken in recent years.
But the council is still “the voice of Bay Area business,” as it proudly proclaims on its website. And among its 280 members are heavy hitters like Bank of America, Chevron, Google, Macy’s, PG&E, Safeway and plenty of other companies that would be hit hard by any increase in state taxes.
It’s also worth noting that while no one is talking about changing Prop. 13’s rules on residential property taxes, there has been plenty of discussion about a split tax roll, with regular reassessments for commercial property, which now provides a smaller percentage of the state’s property taxes than it did before Prop. 13.
While taking taxes off the table may be the right thing politically for a ballot initiative, it’s also a good thing financially for much of the Bay Area Council’s membership, which is a problem for its “honest broker” image.
Jim Wunderman, the council’s CEO, and many other convention supporters have said all along that they prefer a limited agenda that focuses only on budget reform. But that begs the question: who makes up that agenda?
In California, if you have enough money you can put anything on the ballot. So if government reform is just a matter of eliminating the two-thirds requirement for a state budget, modifying term limits or even adding an oil severance tax, supporters should just go to the ballot with their plan and let the people decide, as they have in the past.
But a Constitutional Convention has been sold as a chance for “outside the box” thinking on reform, a place where everything would be up for debate, with the voters of California having the final say.
That’s not as neat and clean as a “focused” convention debating pre-selected topics. But democracy is messy and most voters like it that way.
John Wildermuth is a longtime writer on California politics.