State Legislators Propose

Making the Passage of New Taxes Easier

By Owen Guenthard, Legislative Affairs Director

The California legislature is currently sponsoring a half dozen bills in the Senate that will make it easier for lawmakers to approve new taxes on business. All of these measures propose constitutional amendments to lower the vote requirement for tax increases from the current two-thirds vote to only 55%.

These bills are:

SCA 3 (Leno - D San Francisco) gives school districts and community colleges new authority to enact a parcel tax for education programs through the lowered vote requirement.

SCA 4 (Liu - D La Canada Flintridge) and SCA 8 (Corbett - D San Leandro) gives local governments the new authority to enact special taxes, including parcel taxes for transportation projects.

SCA 7 (Wolk - D Davis) gives local governments the new authority to enact new taxes, including parcel taxes for transportation projects.

SCA 9 (Corbett - D San Leandro) gives local governments the new authority to enact special taxes, including parcel taxes to finance community and economic development projects.

SCA 11 (Hancock - D Oakland) simply gives the local governments new authority to enact special taxes, including parcel taxes, through the lowering of the vote threshold.

Not only will these measures add to the uncertainty of the state's current tax structure, but they will almost certainly bring pressure to increase taxes on commercial, industrial, and residential property owners in California, thereby undermining Proposition 13 protections and discriminate against commercial and industrial property owners versus residential.

While the California Chamber appreciates the current financial pressures on cities, counties, and special districts to maintain the levels of funding for existing services, they do not believe amending the constitution by reducing the local vote requirements to impose new taxes is proper. They feel the current two-thirds vote requirement for taxes provides a fair mechanism by which voters can still approve tax increases while also protecting the interests of small minority groups of taxpayers, many of which do not have a vote and can only voice their opposition and concerns by leaving the state, as many are doing.

The California Chamber opposes all of these proposed measures before the state senate; they are encouraging those who share their assessment to contact their local representative and urge them to oppose these measures.

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Happy 89th birthday to Rick's Drive In and Out employee Evangelina Bravo, who has been a waitress at Rick's for 39 years. She was called in to work on her day off, May 3, and was very surprised to find a birthday party waiting for her when she got to work. From left: Norma Bravo, Evangelina, Isaiaz Jimenez, Rick's co-owner Ramon Flores, and Angelica Ramos.