The Prop. 13 Gorilla

In an editorial in the Santa Barbara Independent, Jerry Roberts writes about the effect that Proposition 13 had and continues to have on California state budgets and financing.

Although focused on property taxes, Prop. 13 imposed a two-thirds vote requirement for raising most other taxes in jurisdictions as well, meaning that even revenue measures for local services backed by large majorities of city or county voters are defeated routinely.

Then-Gov. Jerry Brown and the Legislature reacted to Prop. 13’s approval by passing legislation that effectively took away control of remaining property taxes — and thus governance of schools and many local services — from city councils, boards of supervisors, and special districts and put authority in the hands of Sacramento. This established a crazy quilt of government finance in California with a decline in local control and overall accountability.

The measure provided the same level of tax relief to corporations that owned commercial property as it did for individual homeowners. Throughout time, this has resulted in some areas in a substantial shift in the property tax burden, with business bearing less of the load and homeowners more.