Even Prop 22 Could Prove a Nonstarter in this No-Confidence Climate

Proposition 22 should have been the biggest no-brainer on the November ballot.

Fiscal restraint and local control are bipartisan basics, and Prop 22 capitalizes on both by prohibiting borrowing from cities to close the State budget gap.

Prop 22’s financial summaries leave even less room for opposition: The measure represents just 0.5% of California’s $200 billion budget, and these local funds are slated to support obligations like local law enforcement and education.

In a normal year, voters would be giddy at the opportunity to slap the State’s bloated hand away from the cookie jars of local government.

Then, enter Bell. And Vernon. And event ticket scandals. And misappropriation or nonappropriation of stimulus funds. Before you know it, local governance looks less and less like the solution.

With Villaraigosa and Rizzo’s blatant corruption and gross misconduct still dominating headlines, will voters rally behind a measure predicated on the ability of our local electeds to get the job done?

Maybe, when the alternative is as bad as ours.

In the wake of local scandals, state officials are fumbling the ball in their attempts to capitalize on voters’ crisis of confidence.

Leading the blind is myopic Assemblyman Alberto Torrico (D-Newark), who devised a bill to address voters’ concerns with out-of-control public salaries ahead of the November election.

Sounds great, but Torrico refuses to apply his proposed rule changes across the board. He and his supporters prefer to exempt state office-holders and limit the new restrictions instead to local officials, who have no say in the bill’s passing.

With corruption and confusion rampant at all levels of government, Prop 22 will have a harder time passing than many expect.

Just goes to show that in politics there’s no such thing as a sure thing.