North Bay Business Journal
This June voters at the ballot boxes will decide whether seismic renovations can be exempted from new property tax assessments. The proposition, the Seismic Retrofitting Amendment and ironically numbered Prop. 13, the same as the famed property tax initiative of more than three decades ago, is a legislatively referred constitutional amendment sponsored by state Sen. Roy Ashburn, R-Bakersfield.
With voters becoming increasingly pessimistic about the direction of California, momentum is building for a new initiative to be placed on the November 2010 ballot to authorize a constitutional convention. With voter approval, this would lead to the selection of some 150 delegates (one for each group of 250,000 state residents) who would draft a new constitution by 2011. If all goes as planned, an entirely new constitution could be in place by 2012, paving the way for major reforms in the state’s failed governance system.