Sen. Mark Leno’s bill would lower vote requirement for tax increases to 55%
by Brian Leubitz
The lowering of the vote threshold for local taxes has been an early subject of conversation since the Democratic supermajority appeared on the horizon. Sen. Mark Leno’s bill was introduced in early December to do just that.
Today, George Skelton, joins the call to do just that:
Gov. Jerry Brown wants to help inner-city schools at the expense of suburbanites. But there must be a better way to assist the disadvantaged than to trigger class warfare.
And there is. It is to give school districts a better opportunity to raise their own tax revenue.
That could involve reducing the voter threshold needed for levying parcel taxes from two-thirds to 55%. … California needs all types of school reform, including how we generate money for classrooms – without starting an education civil war.
The idea is certainly getting a lot of attention, but it seems anything but certain that Sen. Leno will be able to muster the 2/3 of both houses to get the measure to the ballot. Both Gov. Brown and the legislative leaders are a bit worried about putting anything else on the statewide ballot that smells of tax increase after the success of Prop 30. But, in the end, the measure just evens out taxes with bond measures and allows communities the right to self-govern.
It just seems like common sense to allow communities to choose their own tax rates.
it seems strange that for a state as enamored as it is with home rule, our ability to govern ourselves is controlled by the ideas of long gone individuals from the suburbs of orange county.
1. Split roll for commercial vs residential properties.
2. Keep Mobile Home Rental Parks and Apartments at the same rate as Residential property tax rates since people live there.
3. A bigger exemption for Seniors and Disabled People, currently I pay $200 a year for Property Taxes on a Mobile Home(that by all rights should be in the Parks name as I’d sold it to them, but cause the manager would have to drive 75 miles each way to complete the paperwork they do nothing, If I can eventually get $901.00 together and move into a house with a mortgage I’ll drop a proverbial bomb in their lap after having moved out, I won’t give them the keys until it’s out of My name, nor will I pay anymore rent or taxes on it, the county could then take possession, all as a hot prod to get them moving, by then I won’t give a crap), out of a possible $270 and that $200 is a lot to Me as I get SSI(Supplemental Security Income) since I’m disabled and $866.40 a month only goes so far and it sure isn’t lavish or extravagant as some in the US House of Republicans have said, but then their a bunch of tone deaf Millionaires, what do they know???