Overturning of Prop. 13 sought in lawsuit (California)

[SunSeeker]

122. Initiatives have been a disaster in CA

Besides the blatantly racist, homophobic initiatives, there's truly evil corporate welfare ones like Prop. 13 or Prop. 26, passed in November of 2010. Like 13, 26 was marketed as helping the little guy with skyrocketing fees by extending the 2/3 voting requirment to fees, like it is with taxes. But in fact, most fees the average person encounters are exempted, such as fees for marriage licenses or fishing licenses, state park entrance fees, or trash collection fees, since they do not “exceed the reasonable cost of providing” the service or product or license to the payor. Who does it help? The initiative's biggest contributor: Chevron (gave $4M). Big tobacco, alcohol and the US Chamber of Commerce also funded this "CA intitiative." Prop. 26 is aimed at saving industry billions on such things as a per-barrel severance fee on oil or fees on cigarettes and tobacco to fund medical treatment, education and law enforcement programs. If a severance fee were enacted, like it is in other states, it would likely cost big oil $1.2B. Last year Gov. Schwarzenegger vetoed a bill that would have raised CA’s oil-spill prevention fee from 5 cents per barrel to 6 cents per barrel. The fund faces a projected $11M deficit and thanks to Prop. 26 it has no chance to recover, even with our new Democractic Governor. The GOP controls more than 1/3 of the legislature; it’s unlikely to get a 2/3 vote. So, with Prop. 26, big oil has managed to push more of the cost of their pollution onto the people, just like businesses were able to push more of the property tax bill onto individual homeowners with Prop. 13.