Roots of Unity
by Gordon Alexandre, Guild President

Proposition 92 - Why We Lost and Where We Go From Here

Now that the dust has settled, it is time to figure out why Proposition 92 failed, what lessons are to be learned, and where we go from here. At the outset I want to make it quite clear that the Prop. 92 campaign was a valiant effort to redress years of community college underfunding and, if it had passed, would have been better for our students, faculty, and the state of California. I also want to congratulate the Guild, and in particular Ramona Barrio-Sotillo, for spearheading the effort here at GCC to get the word out and raise money for the Prop. 92 campaign. We did a terrific job!! We raised about $45,000, exceeding by $10,000 the targeted amount suggested by the campaign. We sponsored a very successful rally/media event in mid-January that got the word out and conducted ROBO calling 10 days or so before the February 5 election. Many of us appeared on local television, did radio interviews, and wrote articles in newspapers. I am proud of our effort, and nothing I'm about to say should be viewed as critical of that effort.

And the Bad News:

The fact of the matter is, however, that we lost. We cannot  sugarcoat this, nor mask our defeat behind some kind of silver lining. Some of the reasons for our loss were beyond our control. In January, the governor announced a $14.5 billion deficit in the state budget over the next 18 months. I think voters got scared that if Prop. 92 passed it would make the deficit worse and, indeed without a cut in other services or a tax increase, it would have. Voters often vote no when they're afraid. I also think that CTA's "betrayal" hurt our campaign in several ways. First, they were the main source of funding for the opposition, raising/spending almost $2.5 million to defeat Prop. 92. That was unanticipated and damaging. Second, by another teachers' union coming out against Prop. 92, the education unions were split. The split allowed our usual political allies, Democrats and progressives, either to remain neutral or join the opposition. No big names helped us carry the ball.

Fundamental Errors

     We cannot simply, however, blame budget woes and CTA for our rather embarrassing loss. It is always easier to blame others for our own failures, but rarely are external factors the fundamental reason for defeat. We must examine how we contributed to our own failure; only by doing so can lessons be learned and true growth occur. I believe the proposition itself was fatally flawed. I thought so at the time, and its defeat only convinces me more of that truth. Prop. 92 tried to do too much, and the crux of the proposition was confusing to voters. The focus of the proposition should have been on stabilizing and increasing funding for community colleges, instead of lowering tuition from $20 to $15 a unit. But the funding issue was difficult to explain, and the lowering of tuition when tuition in the state is already—relatively speaking—low, appeared to be disingenuous. On top of this, the campaign decided to say none of this would increase your taxes, when talking about tax increases would have been the honest thing to say. In my opinion, the campaign should have emphasized maintaining tuition at $20 a unit, allowing increases up to the increase in the cost of living. It should have bothered to explain why the community colleges needed an independent funding stream like the CSUs and the UCs. And to increase community college funding, some taxes will need to be increased. I think voters thought the tuition issue was "bait" and tangential to the real issue, which they really never understood, and they couldn't figure out where the money was coming from.

Can a union be too democratic?

     We also need to raise some critical questions about the CFT- run campaign. We barely met our own funding goal of $3 million. The opposition spent about as much. We didn't have enough money for a saturation media campaign. Some CFT locals more than met fundraising expectations--ours, LA, Los Rios, San Francisco, to name a few. However, over half the CFT locals in the state did nothing or next to nothing. Our union had too much of a laissez-faire attitude toward locals that did not get on board with the campaign. CFT should have tied meeting certain fundraising goals to a continuation of formula-funding (for those locals that have formula-funding), for example. The CFT expects locals with formula-funding to attend the Leadership Conference. Why not tie similar expectations to meeting fund-raising goals for Prop. 92?  Wasn't getting Prop. 92 passed more important than attending the Leadership Conference? I know we are a very democratic union, it's one reason I am so proud to be a member and president of a local in this union, but with so much at stake, I think we were ultra-democratic and it hurt our effort.

Finding Funds—revenues to consider

     The funding problem remains for community colleges, despite the failure of Prop. 92. We still don't have enough dollars to do our jobs; California's community colleges still rank 45th in the country in per-pupil spending; we still don't have an independent revenue stream; and the governor's solution of "cut, cut, and more cuts" simply doesn't cut it. While conservatives and those who don't work in the education trenches may think the problem lies in waste and fraud, we know the real problem lies in not having enough money to do our jobs. Like it or not, we must face the harsh reality that we have a revenue shortage, not an overspending problem. We need to increase taxes--but on whom and what kind? Let me identify where I think we should begin to look for more revenues:

1. Reinstate the Vehicle License Fee to the level it was before it was reduced in 1998. This would bring an immediate $6 billion new dollars into the state coffers;

2. An additional $1 billion would be brought into the state budget by introducing a Severance Tax on oil that emerges from the ground. Many states already have this;

3. Corporate taxes would be $7.3 billion higher had corporations paid the same taxes on profits in 2005 as they did in 1981.

Even Prop. 13??!!

     The phase-out of the federal estate tax will cost California over $1 billion in 2008-'09. In addition, the future of the state demands that we revisit Proposition 13, passed by the voters of California in 1979. That was a completely different time and place than now. I know this suggestion is more controversial than the suggestions just made, but the fiscal problems of California today can be directly traced back to 1979 and the passage of Prop. 13. Here's the problem: It is simply wrong to have two houses, right next door to one another, each appraised at a similar value, with one homeowner paying $1500 a year in property taxes and the other paying $6000 a year in property taxes, because the former has simply lived in the house a lot longer. Those living in their homes longer should pay higher property taxes, and those who purchased their homes more recently should pay less. There should, however, be an overall net increase in property taxes collected. Exceptions, of course, should be made for seniors and those on fixed incomes and so on, but I think you get the point.

     I welcome comments from those who may disagree or agree with either my analysis or suggestions for tax increases. But this is the way I see it. I hope we can build a progressive movement in California to push these things forward and eventually have enough resources to fund all education adequately without penalizing students. &

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