Eleven Propositions have fully qualified for the November 6, after one measure that was scheduled to come before the state’s voters was removed by the California Supreme Court. Those 11 initiatives are:
Proposition 1, The Veterans and Affordable Housing Bond Act of 2018, if passed will authorize the issuance of $4 billion in general obligation bonds for specified housing assistance programs for low-income Californians, farmworkers, manufactured and mobile homes, infill, transit-oriented housing, and veterans’ home loans. Passage would entail an average annual outlay of $170 million over the next 35 years to debt service the bonds.
Proposition 2, the so-called, “There’s No Place Like Home Act of 2018” will, if passed, allow $2 million in bonds to be issued to amend the Mental Health Services Act and actuate the No Place Like Home Program to fund an existing housing program for individuals with mental illness. Debt servicing of the bonds to be issued will be achieved through the diversion of up to $140 million per year that would otherwise go to county-run mental health programs.
Proposition 3 if passed would authorize $8.877 billion in state general obligation bonds for water system infrastructure projects, enhancing water supply, quality, recycling, groundwater sustainability and storage; protecting watersheds and effecting conservation; improving fisheries and restoring key wildlife habitat; improving means of water conveyance; and infrastructure projects. To defray debt service on the bonds, California taxpayers would have to come up with an average of $430 million per year over 40 years.
Proposition 4 is the Children’s Hospital Bonds Initiative, which authorizes $1.5 million in bonds to fund construction, renovations and expansions at pediatric hospitals qualifying for the assistance. The debt service on the bonds would be accomplished by the diversion of $80 million per year from the state’s general fund for 35 years.
Proposition 5, the Property Tax Transfer Initiative, would adjust the historic tax measure Proposition 13, which passed in 1978. The new Propostion 5 would change requirements for homeowners over 55, severely disabled homeowners, and contaminated or disaster-destroyed properties when owners transfer their property tax base to replacement property. If Proposition 5 passes, schools and local governments each would lose an estimated $1 billion annually from the property tax revenue stream and the state would need to in some fashion backfill that loss.
Proposition 6, which carries the somewhat awkward label of the “Voter Approval for Future Gas and Vehicle Taxes and 2017 Tax Repeal Initiative” would eliminate certain specified road repair and transportation funding and would require certain fuel taxes and vehicle fees be approved by the electorate in the future, while repealing 2017 transportation-related legislation, Senate Bill 1, passed by the legislature imposing on gasoline purchasers’ increased taxes and fees designated for road repairs and public transportation. Elimination of the Senate Bill 1 gas tax would reduce by 12 cents per gallon the price of gasoline paid for by California motorists, while defunding hundreds of ongoing or future road projects, maintenance and repairs effors, as well as transit programs.
Proposition 7 would empower the California legislature by a two-thirds vote to
alter its traditional time observances of Daylight Savings Time from April until November and Standard Time from November until April and adopt Daylight Saving Time year round conditional upon the federal government allowing such a shift to take place. There is no anticipated fiscal impact from passage of this measure.
Proposition 8 is an initiative that would put limits on Kidney dialysis clinics’ rates. It would also require those clinics to provide past customers with refunds. The initiative calls for regulating and limiting the amounts that outpatient kidney dialysis clinics could charge for treatment. Rebates and penalties would be imposed if changes exceed limits. Proposition would required dialysis center operations to make annual reporting of their financials to the state. he measure would also prohibit dialysis clinics from discriminating or refusing services based on a patient’s payer, including the patient himself or herself, a private insurer, Medi-Cal, Medicaid, or Medicare. A battle royal over Proposition 8 has attended this year’s election, as six dialysis clinic companies have poured more than $100 million into a campaign to defeat the initiative and several union political action committees and the California Democratic Party have invested $20 million in an effort to get voters to support the initiative. Proponents of the initiative predict that reporting and transparency and state oversight will reduce fraud and overbilling of patients and insurance providers, considered to be rampant in the industry. Opponents say Proposition 8 say it drive many clinics out of business.
Proposition 9, which would have divided California into three states, was ordered removed from the ballot by the California Supreme Court on July 18.
Proposition 10 is a local rent control initiative, expanding the authority of local governments to enact rent control on residential property. It would repeal a state law that currently restricts rent-control policies that cities and other local jurisdictions may impose on residential property. Because of the potential for a reduction in income to landlords, a potential net reduction in state and local tax revenues of tens of millions of dollars per year accompanies this proposition, depending upon decisions and actions by local communities with regard to exercising the rent reduction or freezing authority this proposition would give them.
Proposition 11, if passed would require Proposition 11 would allow ambulance providers to require workers to remain on-call and reachable by a portable communications device during meal and rest breaks. The measure would require ambulance providers to pay workers at their regular rate during breaks, not make workers take a meal break during the first or last hour of a shift, and space multiple meal breaks during a shift by at least two hours. If a worker is contacted during a meal or rest break, the initiative would mandate that the interrupted break not be counted towards the breaks the worker is required to receive. The measure would require ambulance providers to manage staffing levels sufficient to provide employees with the required breaks. The proposal eliminates certain employer liability. Analysts say that a likely fiscal benefit will accrue to local governments from the passage of Proposition 11 in lower costs and higher revenues, potentially in the tens of millions of dollars each year.
Proposition 12 establishes new standards/minimum requirements for confinement of specified farm animals. It bans the sale of noncomplying meat and egg products. The measure will potentially decrease state income tax revenues from farm businesses, probably not more than several million dollars per year. State costs are estimated to be up to $10 million annually to enforce the measure.