Free College, Gas Tax Repeal: How To Sign The Latest Petitions

LOS ANGELES, CA — Should the wealthy pay an estate tax to make California college tuition free for all?

Should California scrap it’s newly enacted gas tax?

Both proposals are being circulated in petitions to put the measures on a statewide ballot in November. For better or worse, they would each have dramatic impacts on the state, but most people will never get to sign these petitions. In fact, most people never get a chance to weigh in on any of the petitions for statewide ballot measures in California.

With these two petitions generating lots of headlines and even more debate, Patch has to wonder: how do you get your hands on a petition that piques your interest?

As it turns out it’s not easy, which likely explains why so few petitions ever succeed in getting a measure on the statewide ballot. From 1912 to 2016 a total of f 1,952 ballot initiative petitions were circulated, according to the California Secretary of State. Of those, only 376 qualified for the ballot, and still most of those were never voted into law. Throughout the state's history, less than 75 percent of the petitions approved for circulation ever made it onto the ballot. These days, proponents of a petition generally have to get signatures from hundreds of thousands of registered voters.

“Only registered California voters can sign initiative petitions,” said Sam Mahood Press Secretary for California’s Secretary of State. “They must provide a wet signature—initiative petitions cannot be signed electronically.”

And that’s why it’s so hard qualifying for the ballot.

Ironically, a petition for a ballot measure that would have made electronic signature gathering failed to get enough signatures.

So how does a civic-minded voter get their hands on the latest petitions?

For most of us that means going to the California Secretary of State website, looking up petitions approved for signature gathering, and calling or emailing the petition’s proponents to find out how you can sign the petition. If you really support the proposal, you can volunteer with the campaign to gather signatures from your circle of friends or out in the community.

To succeed, a signature-gathering process typically needs to be well-funded. Such was the case with one of the more successful drives in recent years, Proposition 64, which led to the legalization of recreational marijuana in California.

The backers of the free college initiative are fighting more of an uphill battle. They don’t have the financial backing of an industry such as cannabis.

“Largely we are student groups and community groups, and we have some labor unions that are supporting this too,” said Angad Bhalla, a coordinator for the College For All Campaign. “Unfortunately we don’t have a lot of billionaires behind us because we are taxing them.”

In fact, they are asking voters to approve an amendment to the state constitution to provide financial aid to cover tuition and some living expenses for all in-state undergraduate students at University of California and California State University campuses and community colleges. The financial aid would be covered by a tax on estate property in California valued at $3.5 million or more transferred upon death. It's supporters claim only the wealthiest 0.2 percent of Californians would be taxed under the law, raising more than 3 billion dollars a year.

In December, proponents began collecting signatures for "The College for All Act of 2018." They need signatures from 585,407 registered voters, which is 8 percent of all votes cast for governor in the 2014. The petitions must be submitted by June 13 to qualify for the November ballot, according to Secretary of State Alex Padilla.

“It’s just logistically extremely hard to do a petition campaign like this without millions of dollars, which is why the petitions that do get on the ballot have big financial backing,” said Bhalla. “Even though this is supposed to be unique and exciting with citizens putting things on the ballot - it’s really just like billionaires putting things on the ballot. Big money has a lot of say.”

Anyone interested in affixing their name to the College For All petition can go to the College For All website to request a petition be mailed, or they can email campaign coordinator Andre Charles at andre@collegeforallca.com, said Bhalla.

One petition for a ballot measure repealing California’s new gas tax increase is having no trouble getting the needed signatures, proponents say. The well-funded and organized group announced plans to halt efforts by paid signature collectors last month because their signature verification process couldn’t keep up with all the signatures flooding in.

“We knew it was popular but the incredible pace is even faster than we expected so we outran the capacity of our verification operation over the Christmas holiday and told our crew managers to slow down so we could catch up,” the petition’s political strategist Dave Gilliard told the Los Angeles Times last month. Within just a month, the group had verified 327,800 signatures of the 587,407 needed to qualify for the November ballot.

Other interesting petitions currently approved for signature gathering include a measure to hold companies liable for data breaches affecting their customers, a petition to repeal a state law that restricts cities from imposing rent-control policies, and a petition to establish the treatment of farm animals whole also banning the sales of products that don’t comply.

One petition that garnered headlines last year after President Donald Trump's election - a bid to make California an independent nation - died when its chief backer announced he was seeking permanent residence in Russia.

Photo: (AP Photo/Al Grillo)