If at first you don’t succeed, try again. This adage applies well to ideas for new ways to tax Californians. Every election cycle we see new ways to be taxed, and higher tax rates, but rarely will we see a tax get repealed. So it is that Assemblyman Alex Lee (D, San Jose) has introduced Assembly...

On December 10, the SJ City Council approved a directional plan which aims to allocate to affordable housing monies raised from a proposed new property transfer tax.  The plan has no guarantees that the monies will actually be spent on housing and has no guardrails to make sure the money isn’t misspent on overpriced new...

Two years ago, when 2013-14 legislative session began, things looked very dark for California homeowners. Democrats, many hostile to Proposition 13, achieved a super-majority in both the Assembly and Senate. Many publicly expressed their hostility to the landmark property tax initiative and one even said he would like to “nuke” Prop 13. Others were a...

Last week, Gov. Jerry Brown delivered the keynote address at a sustainability summit hosted by the Los Angeles Business Council. While the summit focused on California’s environmental, energy and water policy, we have to wonder whether the governor will exert the same effort in support of fiscal sustainability now that he has called a special...

Editor’s Note:  As Jon Coupal explains in detail, Prop. 13’s “coattails” are alive and well in California. In a special election a few weeks ago in Southern California, Susan Shelley, a moderate Republican whose sole message was “protect Prop. 13” has lost by a margin of less than 1%, in a district where Democrats outnumber...