California Propositions 51-59

California has a dizzying array of 17 statewide ballot propositions this year. Here are my recommendations on the first 9 of these measures.

51 YES School Bonds for K-12 and Community College Facilities. $9 billion in total includes $3 billion for K-12 construction, $3 billion for K-12 modernization, $2 billion for Community College facilities, $500 million for career technical education facilities and $500 million for charter school facilities. California has 6.2 million K-12 and 2.1 million community college students. It takes substantial investment every few years to keep up with that. Vote yes.

52 YES Medi-Cal Hospital Fee Program. Extends current fee on hospitals that brings in $3 billion in matching money from the Federal Government to California to fund medical services for 6.7 million children, 1.6 million seniors and 4.5 million low-income families. Endorsed by both the Democratic and Republican Parties, this is a no-brainer.

53 NO Statewide Voter Approval  for Revenue Bonds. Would put even local bond measures, if over $2 billion, up for a statewide vote. It takes away local control of an area's own projects.

54 NO Legislative Procedures and Transparency. It sounds good but would hamstring the give and take of legislative compromise. Every time a comma is changed in a bill it would have to wait another 72 hours for a vote. Sponsored by conservative billionaire Charles Munger.

55 YES Tax Extension to Fund Education and Healthcare. Extends for 12 more years the 1 to three percent income tax increases passed in Prop 30 on high earners to safeguard school and healthcare funding. 1% applies to single filers at $263,000 and joint filers at $526,000; 3% starts for single filers at $526,000 and joint filers at $1,053,000. Remember when the state budget was $20 billion in deficit every year before Prop 30 passed? It's been in surplus ever since. We need to keep this in place.

56 YES $2 Per Pack Cigarette Tax Increase. Tax would go from .87 to 2.87 per pack. The additional revenue, projected to be between $1 billion and 1.4 billion, would go to Medi-cal (70%), Anti-Tobacco Education (10%), Disease research and physician training at the University of California (10%), and administration and enforcement (10%). Almost all the money against this proposition comes from tobacco companies.

57 YES Parole and Rehabilitation for Nonviolent Offenders. We need a prison system able to require rehabilitation and job skills for release, and the ability to offer incentives for nonviolent offenders to take rehabilitative steps and term extensions for those inmates who misbehave and refuse to complete rehabilitative steps. Read the safeguards in your voter pamphlet. The claims of opponents that murderers and rapists would be released are baseless.

58 YES English Proficiency and Multilingual Education.  Repeals 1998's Proposition 227 which mandated English-only instruction. Authorizes school districts to establish dual-language immersion programs as a path to English proficiency. Gives parents of students of limited English proficiency the option to have their children be taught solely in English. Research shows the bilingual approach is the most effective for fostering English proficiency; our educational practices ought to reflect this.

59 YES Citizens United Advisory Question. Asks California's elected officials to use their constitutional authority to propose and ratify an amendment to the federal Constitution overturning the Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission Supreme Court decision that allows unlimited secret corporate money into our election system.