California-wide ballot

Endorsed Vote: No

I like the concepts in general, but $19.9 billion - whoo, that's quite a price tag given our state's current financial situation. Not only that, but it's got the dangerous "and we'll do it all without raising taxes!" argument due to being funded by a bond. It never ends up true, particularly with a bond of that magnitude, and we need to get our debt back in line.

Endorsed Vote: No

Almost $3 billion of bond debt ("without raising taxes!"). I need to research how true the need for and effectiveness of each of these are (more emergency shelters, more affordable homes for seniors/fosters, more social services for homeless), but my initial vote is No.

Endorsed Vote: No

Almost $10.5 billion of bond debt ("without raising taxes!"). I need to research how true the need for and effectiveness of each of these are (overcrowding, earthquake upgrading) and what the geographic distribution would likely look like, but my initial vote is No. It also appears that a good portion of those funds will go toward vocational education and the community college system, when I'd rather primarily target the K-12, UC, and CSU systems instead.

Endorsed Vote: No

Over $4 billion of bond debt ("without raising taxes!"). I need to research how true the need for and effectiveness of each of these are (vulnerablility of flood control structures, delta levees, etc.), but my initial vote is No. I'd also like to find out the geographical distribution this would be likely to have, and how much local projects could realistically be funded locally and how much the state government (and our state taxes) should help out with.

Endorsed Vote: No

I think it's a huge waste to mandate that resources be committed to track someone for their entire life, past when they have served the length of the sentence that was determined to be appropriate for them.

It's not just child molesters - insert crime X here, and I say let the courts punish and/or rehabilitate as best as possible and then move on. Unless the courts determine there's no chance for rehabilitation, let people have a second chance to live their life.

Endorsed Vote: No

I plan to vote No on this for several strong reasons:
1) It's after the fact (won't reduce teen pregnancy)
2) It wrongly assumes that the parents in teen pregnancy situations are mature caretakers
3) Could cause a delay in important medical care while the parents get involved.

Endorsed Vote: No

In the face of other priorities within our state, it is less important to me that the oil companies don't pay taxes in California but they do in Alaska and Texas - sure it's not fair, but it's how it's been in the past and this would be a step toward pushing big business away from California, instead of away from foreign oil producers.

This was the one Proposition that I thought I knew how I would vote without even doing any reading, but that turned out not to be the case when I dug deeper. I would encourage you and those within your circle of influence to instead support an alternate proposition in the next election cycle that increases taxes on imported oil, which is where the taxes should have been instead in order to be most effective.

Endorsed Vote: No

The last thing we need is to make it even more difficult for people to live in their own home in California.

I do like the exemption of elderly and disabled homeowners from the tax, and will look for that in future legislation.