Ground State

For those of you in California - the Feb. 5 voter's guide has been mailed. Propositions 91, 92 and 93, all proposed constitutional amendments, are discussed in the guide. Propositions 94 through 97 are on the ballot but are not written up in the voter guide, apparently having been approved too late for printing. The official voter information from the California Secretary of State on propositions 94 through 97 can be found here.

Here's your Ground State proposition Voter's guide:

Prop 91

Initiated by the same folks who fought for Prop 1A in 1996, 91 restricts the state from taking the gasoline tax revenue away from transportation programs. Prop 1A passed and is law. The folks who initiated Prop 91 now want you to vote no on it, and no one made an argument for it in the voter's guide. There's no reason to vote yes on it, so vote NO because less law is a good thing.

Prop 92

Prop 92 is the community college system seeking to separate itself from K-12 education and get a separate budget from the state, get reduced fees per unit for students written into the law and get the community college system made a permanent fixture of the constitution. According to the Easy Voter guide:

It would increase state costs by about $300 million per year in the near term. It would reduce student fee revenue to community colleges by about $70 million per year.

Constitutionally-mandated spending on the community college system is not in the best interests of anyone save those who work for community colleges. The constitutionally-limited student fees will keep the community colleges from having to fend off any private competition without placing any restriction on their spending. It's a zombie in the making. The argument in favor of the resolution in the state guide is made by the President of the Community College Faculty Association, the President of the Community College Trustees, and the Secretary Treasurer of the California Federation of Teachers. The proposition serves this bureaucracy well. NO on 92.

Prop 93

Prop 93 is not easy to analyze because both sides proclaim their support for term-limits. Current term limits are 3 terms in the Assembly (6 years) and 2 terms in the Senate (8 years) for a total of 14 years. The proposed change is 12 years total in either body. The catch is the 12 year limit applies to new legislators. There are 42 incumbent legislators who will be avoiding term limits with the 'reform', allowing some to serve up to 20 years. I'd be in favor of it if it was 12 years for everyone, but it's not. It's an attempt to skirt term limits for some of the folks in there now who are popular with special interests. NO on 93.

Propositions 94-97

These four propositions are per-tribe proposals to increase, in particular, the number of slot machines each Indian tribe can run at their casinos in return for the state getting a slice of the larger pie. Whether the slice, as a fraction of the total casino revenue, is larger or smaller I can't determine. Revenue to the state will surely increase, and presumably traffic from California to Las Vegas will decrease as more gambling urges are satisfied in-state.

The role of the state government of California in gambling is hypocritical at best. It is shocking to me that free people allow their government to tell them when and how they can gamble with their own money - but that is an argument that could cut either way on these propositions. On the purely pragmatic grounds that California gamblers earn their money here and we should encourage them to "chip-in" in California rather than Nevada - YES on 94, 95, 96 and 97.