September 15, 2016
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact: Steven Maviglio, 916-607-8340
LOS ANGELES TIMES EDITORIAL: VOTE NO ON PROP 53
State’s Largest Paper Warns “The Potential Damage to Local Control is Real”
LOS ANGELES — Noting “the potential damage to local control is real,” the Los Angeles Times today urged its readers to vote No on Proposition 53. To date, every major editorial board in the state is urging NO on 53.
“It’s written so broadly that it could give state voters veto power over large but purely local projects in which they have little or no stake,”says today’s editorial in the state’s largest newspaper.
“Requiring state voters to approve large revenue bond issues would make it more difficult to make badly needed infrastructure improvements in this state, and could even discourage the public-private partnerships that could help fill the gap between what the state needs to build and what it can afford.”
“The fundamental problem…with Proposition 53 is that voters don’t pay for the bonds. That money comes from whoever uses the asset the bonds were used to build.
“The proposition would give voters across the state a say over projects that may never use. Similar veto power could apply to bonds to create or expand a campus in the University of California or California State University system. Even a private, non-profit hospital, which issues revenue bonds through the state and may rely on state Medi-Cal funds to help pay them off, could have to win approval from state voters, rather than just the investors who will shoulder the risk.”
Read the entire editorial here: http://www.latimes.com/opinion/editorials/la-ed-proposition-53-20160914-snap-story.html
The Los Angeles Times joins the state’s other major newspapers, including the Sacramento Bee, San Diego Union-Tribune, San Francisco Chronicle, San Jose Mercury News, East Bay Times, Bakersfield Californian, Santa Rosa Press Democrat, Santa Cruz Sentinel,and the Monterey Herald in opposing Prop 53.
More than 230 organizations across the state representing local government, public safety, water, business, labor, agriculture, educators and more have come out in formal opposition to Prop 53.
Paid for by No on Prop 53 – Californians to Protect Local Control, a coalition of public safety, local government, business and labor organizations, and taxpayers. Major funding by California Construction Industry Labor Management Cooperation Trust and Members’ Voice of the State Building and Construction Trades Council of California (Committee).
Tags: government, local control, policy, prop53