Baha's Ballot Bulletin - November 2022

November 2022 Edition

Editor's Note: This effort was born out of family members and friends looking for advice about the oftentimes confusing ballot measures in California. It was once just a personal email list, then an email service and now it has moved to SubStack where folks can get email alerts as well as have a site to visit to reference the measures.  Feel free to share with friends and family if you find this helpful, and please unsubscribe without hesitation (no feelings will be hurt!) if you don't.  

I do this to help people engage and take part in the process while offering my own viewpoints on the issues, but politics is very personal so if this helps you reach your vote by disagreeing with me, that's great too!  Also note that this is not intended to be a complete analysis, so if you feel passionately about one of the measures I encourage you to dig in.  Above all, participate in the process, a lot of people lived and died to give you that right and it's your most powerful tool for change. 

November 2022 Measures

• Prop 1: Right to Reproductive Freedom Amendment - YES
  This is obviously one of the most personal issues one can vote on, so vote your values here, but I am firmly in the pro-choice camp so recommend a yes vote on this proposition that would enshrine a woman’s right to choose (and right to contraception) in the California State Constitution.
  

• Prop 26: Legalize Sports Betting on American Indian Lands Initiative - NO
  This measure would allow in-person sports betting and dice games at tribal casinos. Prop 26 needs to be considered together with Prop 27 below, because they are competing measures—if they both pass, the one with the most votes will prevail. I have a pretty strong libertarian streak so I generally side on giving people a choice, including a choice to gamble, so I support reasonable legalization of gambling. However, I see this as an attempt by tribal casinos—who are bankrolling this measure—to corner the market and only allow sports betting if you walk into their casino. For this reason, and others as explained below, I am a no on Prop 26 and a yes on Prop 27.
  

• Prop 27: Legalize Sports Betting & Revenue for Homelessness Prevention Fund Initiative - YES
  This measure would legalize online sports betting in California. It is largely funded by the gaming companies who have spent $169M thus far, but they are actually being outspent by tribal gaming interests that have spent $227M against it. As described above, tribes want to only make it legal if you are in their casino, whereas this measure would allow anyone behind a computer to participate. It actually contains some good policy that sets a fair playing field where gaming companies and tribes alike are allowed to create online betting sites, and imposes a 10% tax on them both that will go first to pay for all the State regulatory costs, then earmarks 85% of the revenue to go towards homelessness and mental health programs, with the remaining 15% going to tribes that do not participate in gaming. Estimates have revenue anywhere from hundreds of millions of dollars up to half a billion dollars. This is in contrast to Prop 26 which would not generate much revenue for the State and in fact could cost the State more money in regulation than it brings in. Yes on 27, No on 26.
  

• Prop 28: Art and Music K-12 Education Funding Initiative - YES
  The State of California currently sets aside about 40% of its budget to fund public schools, and this measure would add a dedicated 1% of the General Fund (~$2.13B) to go towards arts and music education in K-12 schools. I am generally against set asides because of the inflexibility they create in tough times, but I am also a very strong supporter of public schools, which are still woefully underfunded especially in lower income neighborhoods. What I like most about Prop 28 is that it would distribute 70% of the revenue to schools based on enrollment, but 30% would be distributed to schools based on their share of low income students enrolled. Arts are important for kids across the board, but low income kids oftentimes miss out on this because of funding shortfalls—Yes on 28.
  

• Prop 29: Dialysis Clinic Requirements Initiative - NO
  I can’t believe we are voting on this again, as I have said before, this is blatant abuse of the California ballot initiative system by a single union—SEIU-UHW based out of Oakland—that is trying to impose expensive and unrealistic rules on kidney dialysis companies as leverage in their labor negotiations. End result would be clinics closing and patients who need this treatment to survive on a daily basis being the collateral damage. This union is making a mockery of our initiative process and voters should send them packing again (for the 3rd time in the last 5 years).
  

• Prop 30: Tax on Income Above $2 Million for Zero-Emissions Vehicles and Wildfire Prevention Initiative - NO
  This one is brought to you by the ride sharing company Lyft that is trying to get California taxpayers to pay for its state-mandated requirement to electrify its vehicle fleet by imposing a tax on high incomes. It’s drafted to hit buzzwords (millionaires, electric cars, wildfire prevention etc.) but I am very selective in supporting new taxes and California already has some of the highest income tax rates in the country (including the highest top income tax rate, by a lot). This just doesn’t come close to that threshold for me, even though I believe climate change is a serious issue and support serious efforts to address it—however, this isn’t it. Unsurprisingly, almost 99% of the support dollars totaling over $36M has come from Lyft alone (disguised as Clean Air California), while the opposition is led by Governor Gavin Newsom. No on Prop 30, we should do better than corporate ballot games to address climate change.
  

• Prop 31: Flavored Tobacco Products Ban Referendum - YES
  This is a referendum on Senate Bill 793 that was signed into law in August 2020 banning the sale of flavored tobacco (including vaping devices). A yes vote here upholds the ban, a no vote repeals the ban. This is a classic big tobacco vs. health advocates issue, and while I recommend a yes here, I do believe flavor is the wrong thing to focus on in the tobacco/vaping wars. In short, I don’t believe banning flavors moves the needle much—which is why we don’t ban watermelon flavored vodka and only allow plain vodka to be sold because kids are more attracted to flavor. It’s inevitable that underage kids will try drinking/smoking etc. irrespective of flavor, and so I would love to see regulations on nicotine concentration and chemicals used in these products—some of these vaping devices kids are using have ridiculously high nicotine content and addict kids in short order, as big tobacco intends. So while I support this, I think we should have a different strategy when it comes to regulation here and hope to see more of a focus on harm minimization, for kids and adults alike.