Statewide Propositions:
Prop 1: Yes
What it is:
“Give the state permission to borrow $4 billion to fund affordable housing construction and rental and home loan subsidies. The money would be used to build and renovate rentals ($1.8 billion), to offer home loan assistance to vets ($1 billion), to construct additional housing in dense urban areas and near public transit ($450 million), to offer down payment assistance and other aid to low- and moderate-income homebuyers ($450 million) and to provide loans and grants for agricultural workforce housing development ($300 million).” CalMatters
Thoughts:
This would help relieve the housing shortage and incentivize multi-family housing and transit-oriented development. The problem is that this is a one time measure (that takes 35 years to pay off) and would really only build something like 12,000 new units, however, it would help make currently vacant and run down properties habitable and available which would have a huge impact, as well as help house a buttload of veteran’s. In total, this measure is needed because we are in a crisis, but it’s not a true solution.
Prop 2: Yes
What it is:
“Give the state permission to borrow $2 billion to fund supportive housing (affordable housing with on-site social and medical services) for those suffering with mental illness. That debt would be repaid with money previously set aside for county-run mental health services.” CalMatters
Thoughts:
This guy is tricky. This is basically circumventing the State having to go through court in order to use money from Prop 63 (which taxes millionaires to fund treatment programs for the mentally ill) to fund housing for the mentally ill. This is proving to be effective in pilot programs, but it does take money away from medical treatment of the mentally ill and instead puts it toward preventative treatment (some would argue that this is equally as important). The tricky part is that if the current court case says the current practice of using these funds for housing is legal, then this measure means nothing. But if the court says that it isn’t, then the passing of this law would allow the State to circumvent the ruling and continue using the funds for housing. The big drawbacks are that cities and local governments are often slow to use funds available to help the mentally ill, but this is a decent stop gap measure that wouldn’t cost tax payers additional funding and have potentially very positive impact on those who would be most effected by it.
Prop 3: No
What it is:
“Give the state permission to borrow $8.9 billion to fund watershed protection ($2.5 billion), water supply improvements including wastewater treatment ($2.1 billion), habitat restoration ($1.4 billion), groundwater management ($1.1 billion), flood protection projects ($500 million), as well as upgrades and repairs to traditional water infrastructure, like canals and dams ($1.2 billion). “ CalMatters
Thoughts:
This is one bitch of a proposition. On one hand, it's saying sexy things like improving wastewater projects and prioritizing projects that support low-income communities. On the other hand, there is very little oversight of these said projects. This bill is divisive as fuck among the liberal-minded, but is drawing support from a wide swath of interests. It’s rare to see a bill supported by both big Ag and The League of California Cities. The Sierra Club has come out against it, but so has The Sacramento Bee. It comes down to this: should the public pay for regional projects that are normally paid for by private interests, and local residents with little to no oversight?
Prop 4: No
What it is:
“Give the state permission to borrow $1.5 billion to fund renovations, expansions, and upgrades at hospitals that treat children. Most of the funding is reserved for the state’s eight private non-profit children’s hospitals ($1.08 billion) and the five hospitals run through one of the University of California campuses ($270 million).” CalMatters
Thoughts:
This only supports a few large private non-profit children’s hospitals and a couple hospitals on UC campuses. This doesn’t support public hospitals that desperately need additional funding. Also, these big ass private hospitals just got additional funds a few years ago, and another one a few years before that.
Prop 5: Hell to the NO
What it is:
“Allow older or disabled homeowners to take a portion of their lowered property tax base with them if they sell their home and move. If you want to get into the weeds, here’s how it works: someone who buys a more expensive house would no longer be required to pay property taxes based on the full market price of the new home, as they would be now in many cases. Instead, the new taxable amount would only increase by the difference in market price between the new and old home. Likewise, someone who moves to a less expensive house would actually see their property fall, dodging a higher property tax bill based on the full market rate of the new property. Instead, their assessed value would decline by the percentage difference in price between the new and old property.” CalMatters
Thoughts:
Eat shit Realtors’ Association. Local governments/school districts would get kneecapped to the tune of losing $2 billion annually to this, and since the State would have to back fill this, that'd be $2 billion added to the State Budget. Wanna know why this is even on the ballot? Because Prop 13 discourages people from moving, so realtors aren’t selling enough housing so they birthed this monstrosity.
Prop 6: NO NO NO
What it is:
“Repeal a recent increase in the gas tax and other fuel and car fees and require voter approval for all transportation-related tax increases in the future. Taxes to be rolled back include a 12-cent hike in the gasoline excise tax, a 4 percent increase in the diesel sales tax, as well as a new annual vehicle fee based on the value of the car or truck.” CalMatters
Thoughts:
Regressive taxes suck, but you know what sucks a helluva lot more? Shit. Fucking. Roads (and transportation). Last year, the gas tax was raised for the first time in 23 YEARS. The roughly 12 cent increase plus additional annual car registration fees ($25-$150 depending on the value of your car) really only adds up to an additional $200- $400 per year for the average family. That’s really not that much, and the improvements to our infrastructure funds jobs, makes our cars last longer, and is better for everyone, especially the poor. The areas that need the most maintenance and improvements are low-income areas. Without this funding, there are entire swaths of California that will not have driveable roads. I am not joking. A yes vote on Prop 6 would eliminate $5.4 billion per year in transportation funding, including almost $1 billion per year for public transportation, safe walking and biking, and multi-use trails. If this bill passes, more than 6500 road projects (here’s a cool map) will come to a halt, THIS IS BAD. In addition, this bill would also make it so that in order to raise taxes for transportation-related purposes, it would require voter approval, as opposed to having our legislators actually do their jobs and figure out how to fix our fucking issues. Here are some great resources to read that go more in-depth about this: LA Times, TransForm, Sacramento Bee, San Jose Mercury News
Prop 7: YESSSSSSSSS
What it is:
“Repeal the the 1949 law that created Daylight Savings Time. If passed, the Legislature would then be able to pass a law with a two-thirds majority finally nixing the biannual tradition of moving clocks backward and forward every spring and fall. That is, assuming the federal government let’s us get away with it. “ CalMatters
Thoughts:
Fuck changing the clocks! It costs us money, increases traffic accidents, increases heart attacks/strokes/death and MAKES US LOSE SLEEP. This is the only thing that Arizona can lord over California. WE MUST BE BETTER.
Prop 8: No
What it is:
“Require companies operating dialysis clinics to payback any profits over 15 percent of qualifying business costs. Payments would be made to insurance companies or to individuals who pay out of pocket.” CalMatters
Thoughts:
Dialysis is a necessity for people who’s kidneys don’t function right, and they need dialysis to live. Most dialysis clinics are owned by two huge for profit companies, who make enormous sums of money (DaVita brought home $1 billion in 2017). In reality, this could increase costs and make care worse. “Every penny collected above the cap (over 115%) would have to be paid back in rebates to private insurers, which cover less than 10% of dialysis patients (about 90% are covered by Medicare and the rest by Medi-Cal and other governmental insurance programs). Clinic operators who exceed the cap would also have to pay a fine to the state. Note that the measure would cap revenues, not profits. And the cap would be set on an artificially narrow definition of patient-related and quality-improvement costs, apparently excluding such unavoidable expenses as malpractice insurance and janitorial services. Supporters say it’s not a problem — dialysis is a $3-billion business in California, and the average profit margin for clinics is 17%. Clinic operators counter that the revenue cap is so low, many clinics — particularly those in smaller chains — would be forced to close because they’d no longer be economic.” LA Times
I want to support unionizing and regulating these godawful companies, but this isn’t the bill to do it.
Prop 10: Hesitant yes
What it is:
“Allow cities to introduce new restrictions on market rents or expand existing rent control policies.” CalMatters
Thoughts:
This proposition is the one I’m most torn on. All it does is repeal Costa-Hawkins. On one hand, rent control can help in the immediate, on the other, it can make the problem worse. Do I believe that cities should have the ability to determine what is best for their communities? Yes. Do I believe that people can be incredibly short sighted and that once something is in place it’s much harder to change it? Also yes. However, this proposition also slips in a law that in order to ever restrict the ability to have rent control again, it would have to be approved by voters. Eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeesh.
In this specific case, I think voting yes would be…helpful? It doesn’t mean that cities will go bumfuck wacko and start rent controlling everything, but it does mean that cities and counties can implement rent control measures according to their needs. Here are some great articles on this: LA Times, LA Times again, SF Chronicle, and the Mercury News
Prop 11: No
What it is:
“Continue to allow private ambulance services to require their emergency medical service employees to remain on call during meal and rest breaks. Also guarantees technicians additional training and some paid medical health services.” CalMatters
Thoughts:
This is a proposition put on the ballot because the for-profit ambulance company AMR is pissed that it is getting sued by it’s employees for over $100 million because they haven’t been paying their employees. This initiative sounds good but offers no regulations about increased staffing, better training, or anything that would actually solve the issues first responders face. Fuck Prop 11.
Prop 12: No
What it is:
“Place specific size requirements on the coops and cages used to contain breeding pigs, veal calves, and egg-laying hens. By the numbers, these news standards require at least:
43 square feet of floor space per calf by 2020
24 square feet of floor space per pig by 2022
1 square foot of floor space per hen by 2020 and cage-free by 2022
It would also require all egg-laying hens be raised in specified “cage-free” conditions by 2022. California businesses would be prohibited from selling any food products that come from animals not raised in compliance with this law, even if they come from out of state.” CalMatters
Thoughts:
I want animals to be treated more humanely. Who doesn’t want that? What I don’t want is small farmers to get shit on with criminal penalties in 36 months. Most farmers have already committed to going cage-free by 2025, speeding up the time line when the guidelines aren’t clear will only put farms out of business and drive up the cost of animal products. This proposition is a fix (sort of) to 2012’s Prop 2, since that proposition was written poorly, but while this adds some additional guidelines, it doesn’t add enough and it pushes up the timeline which will hurt small farmers. Prop 2 back in 2012 already made a buttload of egg farmers leave California, we need those jobs, and low-income families need to be able to afford eggs. The part about “specified cage-free” conditions is not actually well defined, which makes compliance very difficult. This proposition isn’t written well, we can do better.
Statewide Candidates:
Gov.: Gavin Newsom. John Cox sucks cocks (yeah it’s low, but honestly he doesn’t deserve any real thoughts).
Lt. Gov.: Ed Hernandez. He’s very level-headed, has a lot of experience, and advocates hard for the public.
Sec of State: Alex Padilla. He’s able to actually implement improvements well, a rarity.
Controller: Betty Yee. She’s amazing. This office is actually very important, and she does a truly great job at managing the world’s 6th largest economy.
Treasurer: Fiona Ma. She puts a lot of thought into the policies she supports, like finding interesting and better way to fund property taxes that stop shitting on small business owners, and making sure that our obligations to pensioners are upheld. Greg Conlon is a corporate shill “Oh no the billionaires are gonna leave CA because we tax them so much.” Except what they pay in taxes versus what they earn is fucking laughable.
Attorney Gen: Xavier Beccera. He needs to do more to address police shootings, but he has good ideas on how to handle the problem that there are 10000+ in CA who have guns and shouldn’t. He also is putting in effort to improve rehabilitation programs for former prisoners that have been released back into the community.
Insurance Commissioner: Ricardo Lara. He’s a champion for Single Payer healthcare, and recognizes that insurance companies are fucking horrible.
State Board of Equalization Dis 2: Malia Cohen. Girl supports banning high capacity magazines and endorses soda taxes. She’s got some issues with housing, but she’s decent for the most part.
Senator: Kevin De Leon. Feinstein voted to continue letting the NSA spy on us. Fuck her. De Leon supports changing our local transportation infrastructure to something more sustainable and better integrated, doesn’t support the Delta Water Project, and pushes hard to bring undocumented workers out of the dark and into our economy.
Judicial Supreme Court: No for both Corrigan and Yes for Krueger. Corrigan dissented on the vote to legalize gay marriage, not because she doesn’t believe in gay marriage but because she didn’t think the court should decide, and that the voters should instead, which on one hand, okay, but on the other, NO, because it shouldn’t be up to a bunch of easily persuaded and fearful idiots who don’t have the time or resources to really figure something important out, like INFRINGING on people’s rights to be with the one they love. Krueger was appointed by Brown back in 2015 and has been an excellent champion for people’s rights thus far.
Superintendent: Tony Thurmond. He champions transparency and bringing lots of different groups to the table. Tuck isn’t a bad choice, but he offers little in the lines of regulating charter schools.