We will devote quite a bit of space in the FlashReport in the coming weeks to articulating why the five "big bonds" measures on the November ballot — Propositions 1B, 1C, 1D, 1E and 84 — should all be rejected by California voters.
You’ve heard me make the case over and over if you are a regular reader, but if you are new to this site, I can sum up the main over-arching reasons to reject all of this borrowing in just a few paragraphs:
For decades, the liberals who control the state legislature, along with a string of Governors who aided them with budget signatures, have neglected infrastructure investment in California. Instead, these liberals have taken the state budget (which is now well over $100 billion annually) and have put much of that money into their lefty social engineering programs and into fattening the state bureaucracy.
Lack of proper funding for infrastructure has also been exacerbated because of initiative and ballot measures that have been passed by voters over the years that create ‘locked in’ formulas for spending – usually because the voters are taking into their own hands setting spending priorities (because they were unhappy with the job the politicians in Sacramento were doing?).
While I think that ballot-box budgeting is a bad idea, until a global solution to the problem is reached, I could have supported a ballot measure this year that would have required a fixed percentage of the state’s budget each year (say 10%?) must be spent on infrastructure. In other words, a solution to use current revenues to the state to make the necessary investment in California’s infrastructure needs.
**There is more – click the link**