Here is how I am voting on the ballot propositions in the election next week. I’ve been writing these posts for the last two elections, and the act of writing this up made me read up and study them more thoroughly, so doing it again.

I corrected my mistake from last time, and got paper voter materials. It was far easier and more enjoyable to read than the PDF, and my freshly-minted voting-age cousin Nitish and I even made an evening of studying the state level measures together!

Ballot Measures: State

In general, I think it is better for laws to be passed by the legislature than by ballot measure. There is more flexibility — a law passed by ballot measure can’t be repealed by the legislature, and ballot measures are fairly cumbersome and expensive to do over. There is also less nuance possible — while there’s debate and discussion, and the law goes through several revisions as it passes through committee, state assembly, and state senate, ballot propositions need a yes/no vote and are passed as written.

Thus, when deciding how to vote on a ballot measure, I try to answer two questions: (1) is it good policy, and (2) does it meet the bar for a ballot measure to pass a law. The answer to both should be in the affirmative for me to vote yes.

• Prop 2: School and Community College Infrastructure Bond — YES: Both the state assembly and senate passed this law by a pretty high margin, but issuing new bonds needs approval by voters, so this also needs a ballot measure. Do I think this is good policy? I am honestly not sure — there’s seems to be a lot of government waste, especially in infrastructure projects (e.g. the infamous $1.7 million toilet in Noe Valley); but we shouldn’t not invest in infrastructure either. Since I feel strongly about the legislature passing laws, though, I will let the near-unanimous votes by them be my tiebreaker, and vote yes

• Prop 3: Reaffirm Gay Marriage — YES: This doesn’t change anything, since gay marriage is already legal nationwide. Marriage equality is good policy, though, and this perhaps adds more protections at the state level if there are Supreme Court or federal government shenanigans. Voting yes.

• Prop 4: Water and wildfire prevention bond — YES: While I do believe that government should protect people from negative effects of climate change, there is nuance — e.g. suburban sprawl is bad, and people choosing to live in increasingly remote areas with the belief that government will bail them out in case of disasters is also bad. I guess I’ll defer to the legislature again, and vote Yes.

• Prop 4: Lower voter approval threshold for local housing bonds — NO: I’ll break from my ‘trust the legislature’ on this one. Housing is a pretty important issue for me, but I’ve only seen local government obstruct and delay housing, with the state government forcing reform through. This prop seems to shift some of the balance of power to local governments, who frankly, have not earned my trust.

• Prop 6: Ban involuntary servitude in prisons — YES: Seems like good policy, needs to be a ballot proposition because it is a constitutional amendment, and has been near-unanimously approved by the legislature. Voting yes.

• Prop 32: Increase minimum wage — NO: My understanding is that workers in San Francisco and other rich urban areas are paid above 18$ already, so this really only affects the Central Valley and other rural communities. In economic theory, minimum wage creates an artificial price floor and creates a surplus supply of labour (unemployment). I don’t know if this is good policy, and the legislature could raise minimum wage if they wanted — voting a default NO.

• Prop 33: Expand rent control — NO: I don’t think rent control is good policy — it favours incumbents at the expense of newcomers, and creates housing shortage by creating an artificial price ceiling, leading to gap in demand and supply. Voting no on this.

• Prop 34: Limit AIDS Healthcare Foundation spending— NO: My understanding is that this ballot proposition specifically targets an organisation called the AIDS Healthcare Foundation to restrict how they can spend money. The legislature could do this if it were good. Voting No.

• Prop 35: Tax to fund Medi-Cal — NO: I don’t think earmarking specific amounts of money to be spent on specific things via ballot initiative is good. It is better for the legislature to do so when they pass a budget, leaving them some flexibility depending on the revenues and priorities of that specific year.

• Prop 36: Harsher punishment — NO: This effectively reverses Prop 14 of 2014. I am not convinced that mandatory minimums are good policy — justice system professionals (judges, DAs, police) should have some discretion (within the law) to be able to do their jobs effectively. Mass incarceration has proved to be failed policy, and California despite having lower incarceration rates by US standards, faf exceeds incarceration rates relative to other developed counries. Voting no.

Ballot Measures: City

While my overall thinking around city ballot measures is similar to how I think of the state-level ones, I lower my bar to vote Yes for a measure at the city level somewhat, compared to state level ones (if I think it is sound policy) for a few reasons. One is that I think the San Francisco board of supervisors is a particularly dysfunctional government body, and so some direct oversight is good. The second is that city elections happen more frequently than state-wide ones, so these are slightly easier to amend. They are still incredibly expensive and wasteful, though, so I might vote no for what I think is good policy, if I think it should pass legislatively instead.

• Prop A: School Bonds — YES: Same as the bond measures above — the schoold board unanimously approved this and I want to trust the legislators (though SFUSD seems particularly poorly managed, so there’s also that)

• Prop B: Public Infrastructure Bond — YES: Another bond measure that both the Mayor and the Board put on the ballot.

• Prop C: Inspector General — NO: I am skeptical that adding more bureaucracy within the city government will do much to curb corruption. I do think corruption and waste is a legitimate problem, but it probably needs state and federal oversight, rather than adding another post within the existing framework

• Prop D: City Commissions — YES: My initial thought on this was a NO — capping the number of commisions to 65 seems arbitrary. The opposing Prop E, though, also agrees on the specific problem of too many commissions, though, making me think maybe this is a problem worth solving. Further, Prop E is so hilariously bad, this one looks sensible in comparison. I’m not very sure, but a tentative yes for this.

• Prop E: City Commissions — NO: “We have too many commissions, so let’s set up a commission to study how we can reduce commissions”, lol no.

• Prop F: Police Staffing and Retirement — YES: Allowing police to defer retirement for a few years makes sense, I guess? I’m not sure why this is on the ballot rather than just being passed by the board of supervisors, maybe because it is a charter amendment?

• Prop G: Affordable Housing subsidies — NO: Similar to Prop 35 above, earmarking how the city must spend its tax revenue with no flexibility year over year isn’t great. This is worse because it doesn’t even have a dedicated funding source, and is pulling money from general revenue. A clear no from me.

• Prop H: Firefighter Retirement Benefits — YES : Same as Prop F above, I’m annoyed that we make these minute administrative decisions at the ballot box, rather than just doing them legislatively. Begrudgingly voting yes, because the board of supervisors seem to think this will help with staffing.

• Prop I: Nurse Retirement Benefits — YES: Another one, same as above.

• Prop J: Children and Families Fund — NO: Another inflexible mandate about how tax revenues are to be spent. Voting no.

• Prop K: Great Highway Park — YES: This is another one of those silly things that the Board of Supervisors and mayors should just decide rather than putting ont the ballot. I’ll make an exception and vote yes on this one, though, because of my really positive experience with car-free JFK that was similarly passed in 2022

• Prop L: Tax Uber to fund Muni — YES: I’m really for supporting walking, cycling, and transit as viable ways to get around the city. Prop L will probably make taking rideshare in the city more expensive, which also seems like a positive to me if it decreases the number of cars on city streets. I do wish this were done legislatively, but like Prop K, I’ll make an exception and vote yes.

• Prop M: Simplify business tax — YES: This is far too complex a change to be made by ballot initiative. Unfortunately, it needs to modify policy that was passed in 2014 by ballot initiative, and so we’re stuck in this cycle. I’ll be honest — I do no understand the changes here, I’m voting yes, because the Mayor and supervisors seem to support it.

• Prop N: First responder fund — NO: Do this legislatively. Voting no

• Prop O: Support Reproductive Rights — YES: A non-binding resolution that doesn’t change anything concretely. Seems similar to Prop 3 at the state level, and voting yes for similar reasons.

If you want to discuss or debate or change my mind about any of these, please shoot me a message!