Aug 11 2009

March on Sacramento

It’s time to fix California.
by Clint Reilly

Rome is burning. But this time, the reformers aren’t fiddling.The CCC – California Constitutional Convention – can’t happen soon enough.

The alarming spectacle of our state capitol going up in smoke has moved the Bay Area Council – a Northern California group of business leaders led by its savvy executive, Jim Wunderman – to call for a constitutional convention to repair California state government.

I have known Wunderman since he was a young star in the office of then-San Francisco Mayor Dianne Feinstein. Over 20 years, he has evolved into one of the state’s true leaders. Fed up with the dysfunction in Sacramento, Wunderman hatched the idea of a constitutional convention to set things straight.

The proposal has caught on.

In an unusual turn of events, California citizens are listening to a business group. By a 59% majority, state voters favor a convention to rewrite California’s constitution.

The Los Angeles Times, San Jose Mercury News and Sacramento Bee have backed the convention with editorials. Longtime Capitol observers such as the Bee’s Dan Walters and George Skelton of the Times have given up on the legislature’s ability to self-correct and strongly endorsed the idea.

Widespread support from local governments and citizens signals that a constitutional convention may really occur.

The proposal on the drawing board calls for a 2010 initiative to empower the citizens to call a convention, a reform convention in 2011, and a set of proposals on the 2012 ballot alongside President Barack Obama.

But the voters patience may not last that long. Experts predict another budget crisis lurking around the corner that will fire voter disgust and ignite the kind of popular explosion that produced Proposition 13 in 1978.

We may see the citizens marching on Sacramento as early as 2010. It would be good for our state if they did.

I think a new beginning – symbolized by a remaking and renewing of our system of governance – is exactly what a constitutional convention would bring.

I’m not surprised by the growing firestorm of protest. When I first started running campaigns, I got a rush every time I went to Sacramento to fraternize with legislators, meet with staffers and strategize with the Senate Pro-Tem. But as time wore on, the corrupt culture of Sacramento became profoundly debilitating.

Otherwise honest leaders maneuvered within a corrupt system in which special interests legally controlled legislators with campaign contributions instead of bribes.

Small-time politicos acted like they were big-time power brokers. Big-time interests acted like small-time thugs to protect their turf.

Matters have only gotten worse since 2000. Term limits have turned legislators into lobbyists’ puppets. The 2/3 requirement to approve budgets and new taxes has ushered in minority rule. Our reliance on the income tax has robbed the state of a stable, predictable revenue stream to finance government. Special interests have contributed more than $1 billion to state campaigns since 2001. They have blocked vital reforms in our prisons and schools.

Budgeting the biggest state in America and the globe’s sixth largest economy has become an embarrassing exercise in gerrymandered accounting and month-to-month robbery of cities to pay the state’s bills.

Reform candidates for the legislature face an amoral avalanche of smears and character assassination via special interest-financed television commercials and mailings. I speak from personal experience: In 2006 when my wife, Janet, ran for the Assembly, she was targeted with a $3 million smear campaign by Sacramento interests.

Still, a constitutional convention can succeed.

Reform initiatives must have three elements to win. First, they must save taxpayers money. Second, they must reduce bureaucracy and decrease the size of government.
Third, they must benefit the many, not the few – the public interest, not the special interests. A constitutional convention will accomplish all three objectives.

Nevertheless, reform proposals all face the same special interest assault. Somewhere in the fine print, opponents will find fodder for a red herring attack. A massive media campaign will then manufacture the bogeyman.

But today there is no greater bogeyman than the decades of decadence and dysfunction in Sacramento. The Capitol’s last hurrah may be upon us.