CURRENT NEWS ISSUES
This page last updated on February 13, 2002
YES ON MEASURE V
Why I am voting Yes on Measure V
LEONARD KRANSER is this Website's Editor
We have worked hard and contributed much toward the goal of obtaining an anti-airport majority on the Board of Supervisors. We almost won a third anti-airport seat with Dave Sullivan against Jim Silva in 2000. We hope we will win it with Chris Norby against Cynthia Coad in March.
It would be a tragedy to have the people finally take back control of the County government, only to lose it if the Governor appoints a pro-airport replacement for Todd Spitzer. Spitzer looks to be the winner of a vacant seat in the state legislature.
If there is any doubt that we are at risk of a pro-airport appointment, consider this. Dave Ellis signed the ballot statement in opposition to Measure V. He's the political consultant for the Airport Working Group and for the George Argyros created Citizens for Jobs and the Economy currently headed by Bruce Nestande. The only other signer against Measure V is Richard Taylor of the Newport Beach based Airport Working Group. He is an attorney and pro-El Toro activist. These are two individuals dedicated to building El Toro Airport by any means possible.
Even when Measure W passes, we need a majority on the Board of Supervisors and the Local Redevelopment Authority to quickly dismantle the airport planning operation, undo many past board actions regarding El Toro reuse and change the direction of county lobbying efforts in Washington regarding the base transfer.
For more reasons for a Yes on V, read Supervisor Todd Spitzer's op-ed below.
It's a mystery why opponents want to chance voters' under representation
TODD SPITZER is an Orange County supervisor.
On March 5, Orange County voters will be asked to vote on Measure V, which calls for one change to the current governing structure of the county. Measure V will allow you, the voter, to elect a replacement on the Board of Supervisors should an unscheduled vacancy occur. That's all Measure V does.
It adopts all other state law and previously enacted propositions and measures that the voters have approved, including term limits. Orange County is now a general law county. Under our current status, if a vacancy occurs on the Board of Supervisors, the governor handpicks a supervisor to represent the more than 500,000 constituents in that supervisorial district.
As a matter of good government, no governor should make such an appointment. Policymakers, whenever possible, should be elected by the people they represent. This guarantees that a supervisor is truly representative of the people. It also does not give a "leg-up" to a governor's appointee who would then have an unearned advantage as an incumbent at an election. Measure V also institutes timelines to eliminate long and unnecessary delays in filling a vacant seat.
Under general law, there is no deadline for a governor to make an appointment. Now more than ever, Orange County has a unique and complex political environment that will suffer from any prolonged vacancy on the Board. Recently, in Siskiyou County, the Board of Supervisors experienced an unscheduled vacancy due to the death of a supervisor. Our current governor took more than one year to select a successor.
The people of that district remained voiceless, while other supervisors made decisions for constituents that did not elect them. In Orange County that is not acceptable. The two leading opponents against Measure V are attorney Richard Taylor, who is a county gadfly, and Dave Ellis, who is a highly paid county lobbyist. They both know how to work the system and broker backroom deals.
Unfortunately, their objections to this measure come from a deep-rooted self-interest. They would rather keep direct influence over Sacramento politicians with their ability to lobby them with campaign contributions. These political insiders don't care about your right to vote. They only care about their ability to influence people who will help them make money. More surprisingly to me, Orange County Tax Collector John Moorlach has lent his voice to the few who don't want you, the voter, to choose your elected leaders.
In a recent commentary, he makes the argument that the passage of Measure V would put too many decisions in the hands of the voters and that the voters would abuse their voice through the local initiative process. However, California law gives the voter the initiative process as a safeguard against abuses of power by local government and that cannot be taken away. Remember Moorlach's own failed Measure G, which was overwhelmingly defeated in favor of Measure H last March, after he failed to convince local voters that the tobacco litigation settlement dollars should not be used for health care?
Did Moorlach protest about initiative tinkering when he introduced Measure G? Or does he just want to limit access to the initiative process to political insiders like himself? Moorlach also contends that Measure V would somehow do away with county term limits. The board was very concerned about protecting term limits when we approved Measure V for voter consideration. That is why we insisted that these prior voter adopted measures be preserved within the language of the charter.
Section 203 of the proposed charter provides: "Ordinances of the County of Orange adopted by the voters prior to the enactment of the charter shall remain in full force and effect and may only be modified or repealed by a vote of the people." The county's chief legal counsel clearly agrees. In his legal analysis to the Board of Supervisors he writes, "We conclude that the language of the proposed charter and the requirement of the Government Code dictate that the adoption of the proposed charter would not impact the County's term limits ordinance."
Neither Moorlach, Ellis nor Taylor bothered to attend any of our five publicly-noticed hearings or let their views be known before the board approved the initiative for the ballot. Why now? Moorlach also points out that only 13 of the 58 counties have a charter. True. The most populous and influential counties in this state such as San Diego, Los Angeles, San Bernardino, San Francisco and Sacramento are charter counties and do control their own destiny.
Orange County now is the second most populated county in California and fourth in the nation. I contend that Orange County voters deserve the political empowerment to determine who serves as a supervisor and should join San Diego, Sacramento and other self-determination counties in filling vacancies by vote and not by a distant governor. Orange County residents deserve the fundamental right to vote for their supervisors. That's all Measure V does. When a small, but vocal, group of people advocate taking away your political voice you should question their personal and political motives and agendas.
Measure V assures the voters an independent supervisor who can stand up, with the support of his or her constituency, and fix what's wrong in county government. Supervisors overseeing county departments and elected officials is the Orange County bankruptcy lesson. That is exactly why we need a strong, voter-approved supervisor, not an appointee who may be afraid to take on political risks or find himself bullied by powerful county insiders while awaiting an election. After all, supervisors are elected to supervise.