On Wednesday, the Los Angeles city council took a step closer to adopting full-public financing for municipal campaigns. Although five of the council members expressed the usual concerns about tax-dollars for campaigns, the full 15-member council voted unanimously to draft a measure that could be placed on the March ballot. Check out the LA Times story.
Reflecting the unimpeachable tidiness of the current members, the city council also voted to change the name from Clean Money to "full-public financing". I still think "voter-owned elections" best captures the intent and philosophy of public-finance.
A successful drive for public-finance in the second most populous city in the nation would obviously be a huge boon for the movement.
In what should surprise no one but will hopefully educate some obstructionist legislators, a poll commissioned by California Common Cause found that California voters prefer that an independent commission conduct redistricting rather than the Legislature.
Even voters who defeated the misconceived Proposition 77 support an independent commission by twenty percentage points.
Check out this powerpoint presentation of the poll results.
Meanwhile, SCA 3, a California Common Cause supported bill that would create such an independent commission is working its way through the legislature.
If you didn't show up for work every fifth day and didn't tell your boss where you were going, chances are you wouldn't last very long in that job.
But California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger (GAS) has no problem skipping work for a total of 163 days since assuming office in 2003. That's over five months total that Arnie has been out of the state, often leaving scant details of where he is going or why. Check out this Associated Press story for the full scoop.
Of course, it takes time raising $50 million dollars, which is what GAS has indicated he needs for his re-election. Maybe if he spent more time working, he wouldn't need a second term to accomplish his policy goals. It's kind of like asking your teacher for an extension to finish a paper because you skipped class instead of writing it.
Californians overwhelmingly feel that their Capitol is run by special interests. However, given the tenor of last week's committee hearing on the California Clean Money Bill, modeled on the Arizona and Maine public-finance laws, it seems that Californians will have to get used to it.
Opponents of the Clean Money (AB 583) bill found various details to attach their criticism to at the April 19 Senate Elections Committee hearing. Several senators spent a great deal of time predicting how the system would be gamed by politicians, in spite of contrary testimony that such hypothetical situations simply had not occurred in states where Clean Money has already been adopted. While acknowledging the valid problem of privately-funded independent expenditures in a publicly-financed campaign, it is difficult to escape the conclusion that these senators simply don't support reforming the current system that emphasizes wealthy contributors at the expense of the vast majority of Californians who feel that their voices are not heard in the Capitol.
The bill still needs to be voted on by that committee. But, after the hearing, it seems only great pressure from leadership will force these reluctant senators to see the light. Senate President Don Perata has been telling the hundreds of California Common Cause members who have been calling his and other senators' offices that he supports the bill. If he truly does, hopefully he can help these two termed-out Democrats on the committee get out of the way.
Hi folks. This is Theis Finlev, policy advocate for California Common Cause.
I have spent the last month trolling through campaign disclosure reports for this oh-so special election. Riverting stuff! Come election day, the various campaigns will have spent over forty bucks per voter "educating" the public. Mmmmmmm, I love my McMocracy!
To help the public and reporters keep track off all the money being thrown around, I created Pay-dar, a user-friendly (hopefully) way of keeping track of who's paying for what. Check it out and let me know if you have suggestions.
If you are having a hard time slogging through the ridiculous amount of money thrown at the propositions or want to know where the $250 million came from that's funding the special election, then put Pay-dar on your Radar
To help voters track the ins and outs of big money contributions to November's initiative campaigns, we created Pay-dar - a useful tool to track the true source of special election contributions.
So What's behind the barrage of proposition campaigning?
To find out more go to the website of California Common Cause.
If that doesn't satiate your need for our observations about campaign finance, check out these news stories via KTVU by clicking here and here.
Common Blog
