The Cost of Bonds

Voter-approved bonds cost the average Los Angeles homeowner $1,400 per $100,000 value last year. That’s about $5,775 a year on an average $500,000 home. Here’s how it breaks down:

* figures are rounded

SOURCES: Los Angeles County Assessor, Los Angeles County Auditor-Controller, Daily News research

A Crowded Ballot

California voters will consider 13 ballot measures in November (totaling nearly $43 billion in bonds and $3.2 billing in annual tax increases).

Prop. 1A:  Transportation funding protection.  Secures funding source for transportation by closing most Proposition 42 loopholes that allow the Legislature to raid sales tax funds that are supposed to go toward transportation projects.

YES - Protects tax funds that are necessary to repair and maintain  our freeways and transportation system from the legal poaching for other projects.

Bond Measures:

Noon all Bond Measures.  Good for bond buyers, bad for taxpayers. We already have a structural deficit that will not close with more borrowing.  Bonds are the absolute worst system to finance items.  We immediately lose ~7% to the already rich bond brokers.  Then with interest, we pay twice the amount of the bond.  This results in only getting the benefit of about 48.5% of the money spent. 

Bond measures are basically disguised taxes.  Before we even consider more debt for our children, we must fix the system first. We do not have a revenue problem that prevents taking care of our roads, our schools, our levees, and our ports, we have a spending problem.  We have to audit the wasteful bureaucracy and start spending on priorities first instead of the current system of spending on pet projects of campaign contributors and holding the items that the public wants hostage to raise taxes. 

Prop. 1B:   Transportation bond.  Authorizes a $19.9 billion bond for transportation projects, including freeway repair, seismic safety for bridges, public transit, reduced air pollution and port security.

NO - We should pay as we go instead of digging a bigger deficit hole. Use the tax money from all the gas and oil taxes which is supposed to be used for improving our freeways first before we tax ourselves again.

Prop. 1C:   Housing bond.  Authorizes $2.85 billion bond for affordable housing and battered women’s shelters.

NO - This, in large part, will go to subsidizing the the labor costs of big businesses and shifting those cost to the middle class taxpayer.  It will also go in large part to finance the huge illegal immigrant population which will only result in more illegal immigration.  Whatever you pay for, you get more of.  We will end up having more people wanting "so-called" affordable housing instead of less.

www.NoProp1C.com

Prop. 1D:   School bond.  Authorizes $10.4 billion bond for K-12 and college facilities, to build new classrooms, repair older schools and upgrade public college and university buildings.

NO - This bond measure (tax) will allow the legislature to take money from across the state and spend it where they want.  They have already proven incapable of doing the right thing with our money, we should not give them more.  A large part of this money will likely go to finance the continued influx of illegal immigrants.  If we continue to pay for this problem instead of correcting it, more school systems will end up like the Los Angeles School system with its approximately 65% dropout/failure rates.

www.protecttaxpayers.com

Prop. 1E:   Flood protection.  Authorizes $4.1 billion bond to repair levees and other flood control and water supply structures.

NO - Another subsidy for rich agribusiness and land developers.  It also shifts the costs from people that bought homes in vulnerable areas to all taxpayers across the state.  We should reduce the regulations that bloat the cost of repairing the levees.  Also, the local communities should pay for the protecting their own communities, instead of shifting the costs to the taxpayers.

www.protecttaxpayers.com

Prop. 83:  Jessica’s Law.  Increases penalties on sex offenders and child molesters, including requiring registered offenders to submit to lifetime monitoring by Global Positioning System.

YES - Our children deserve the protection of the toughest sex offender and punishment laws in the nation . Our state legislature and their committees would not pass this initiative, which would put California at the forefront with the toughest laws in the country against sexual predators.

www.83YES.com

Prop. 84:   Water supply and flood control.  Authorizes $5.4 billion in bonds to fund projects for safe water supply, flood control, natural resource protection and park improvements.

NO - A special interest packed bill which will go more to lining the pockets of those that put it on the ballot rather than to projects that the taxpayers would benefit from.  Please do not be fooled by the title as no money will go to funding dams or water storage.  The other items should be financed locally so that the people can hold local officials accountable.

www.protecttaxpayers.com

Prop. 85:   Requires physicians to notify parents at least 48 hours before performing an abortion on a minor.

YES - Restores parental supervision for their minor daughters, for a potentially life threatening procedure.  Provides legal protection from those very rare caregivers that abuse their children. Only those that financially benefit or have a sick political agenda would oppose this measure.  Please protect our girls and families and vote yes.

www.Yeson85.net

Prop. 86:   Cigarette tax.  Increases existing cigarette tax by $2.60 a pack to fund health programs such as emergency services, children’s health insurance and tobacco use prevention programs.

NO - This is a despicable measure that shifts the costs of uninsured health care to an easily targetable minority.  A big reason for our failing health care system is the huge population of illegal immigrants that use our emergency systems.  We have to come up with a solution on illegal immigration and not shift the costs to a minority group.  This would also give a blank check with exemptions from antitrust laws to the big business HMOs and would exempt this money from going to our schools.

www.86facts.org

Prop. 87:   Oil tax.  Places a tax from 1.5 percent to 6 percent, depending on the price of oil, on the extraction of oil from the ground in California.  Revenue of $200 million to $380 million per year would fund alternative energy programs and research.

NO - As much as I would love to stick it to the greedy oil companies, this is not the way to do it.  Another unaccountable bureaucracy put in place by billionaire venture capitalists that will get taxpayer money instead of using their own money to maybe develop the new technologies.  With Enron style accounting available, the taxes will be paid by the taxpayer and not big oil.

www.NoOilTax.com

Prop. 88:   Parcel tax.  Places a tax of $50 on every parcel, generating funds up to $500 million per year for schools.

NO - We do not want to head down this path.  Taxes a one room shack the same as a multimillion dollar home.  If we pass this, homeowners will become an endangered species as tax after tax will be putt on the ballot to shift the costs to homeowners.  This type of tax only belongs at the local level, so that the people paying the taxes can hold the local officials responsible for results.

www.NoProp88.com

Prop. 89:   Public campaign financing.  Increases income tax on corporations and banks by 0.2 percent to fund public financing of political campaigns.  Would generate at least $200 million a year.

NO - Proposition 89 sounds good, but will result in even more problems in the long run. Running as a challenger, money has been hard to come by, but we do not want to allow government to control the political process.  The long term solution is to get the voters to take an active role by making small donations to candidates and volunteering in their neighborhoods. 

www.noprop89.org

Prop. 90:   Eminent domain.  Places new restrictions on the governments ability to seize private property, including prohibiting the taking of land to benefit private projects.

YES - Another bill that could not make it out of committee in the Legislature. Property rights are a fundamental part of Democracy, if Government can punish people by taking away their homes for the benefit of the politically connected, then no one will be able to oppose the tyranny of Government. They will be cowed by the ability to take their home.

www.90Yes.com 

Source:   California Secretary of State’s Office 

2006 Primary ballot measures below