BILL ANALYSIS �
SENATE COMMITTEE ON ELECTIONS
AND CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENTS
Senator Lou Correa, Chair
BILL NO: SB 202 HEARING DATE: 5/3/11
AUTHOR: HANCOCK ANALYSIS BY: Frances Tibon
Estoista
AMENDED: AS INTRODUCED
FISCAL: YES
SUBJECT
Ballot initiatives: filing fees
DESCRIPTION
Existing law establishes a process for the Attorney General
(AG) to prepare a summary of the chief purposes and points
of a proposed statewide initiative measure. Requires the
AG to provide a copy of the title and summary to the
Secretary of State (SOS) within 15 days after receipt of
the final version of a proposed initiative measure, or if a
fiscal estimate or opinion is to be included, within 15
days after receipt of the fiscal estimate or opinion
prepared by the Department of Finance (DOF) and the Joint
Legislative Budget Committee (JLBC).
Existing law requires proponents of any initiative measure,
at the time of submitting the draft of the measure to the
AG, to pay a fee of $200, which shall be placed in a trust
fund in the office of the Treasurer and refunded to the
proponents if the measure qualifies for the ballot within
two years from the date the summary is furnished to the
proponents. If the measure does not qualify within that
period, the fee shall be immediately paid into the General
Fund of the state.
This bill would increase the current $200 filing fee to
$2,000.
BACKGROUND
Increasing Number of Initiatives and Ballot Summaries .
According to the AG's office, there has been a steady
increase in the number of statewide initiative proposals
submitted in the last few decades. The following
illustrates the increased number of filed initiative
proposals:
47 from 1960 to 1969
180 from 1970 to 1979
282 from 1980 to 1989
391 from 1990 to 1998
647 from 2000 to 2009
Although reports show that there has been a recent decline
in the number of voter approved initiatives, the AG is
still required to develop a title and summary for each
initiative, regardless of whether the initiative qualifies
for the ballot.
In California, proponents of an initiative measure must
submit the text of a measure to the AG's office for
preparation of a title and summary and pay a $200 filing
fee before they can circulate petitions for signatures.
Originally set in 1943, the filing fee was intended to
cover the administrative costs of the initiative process to
the state and to discourage frivolous proposals.
Over the course of the 66 years since the initiative filing
fee was designated, the nature of the initiative process
has changed dramatically. Data provided by the AG's office
shows the median cost in 2007-2008 to title and summarize
each of the 126 initiatives for that cycle was $3,157. In
total, the state received $22,800 in filing fees but it
spent $418,459 of taxpayer money (General Fund) and 2933.75
hours of paid state attorney time to title and summarize
all 126 measures. One measure from the November 2008
General Election cost nearly $20,000 to title and
summarize; since the fee was refunded, the entire cost was
paid through the General Fund.
COMMENTS
1. According to the author , SB 202 does not target
good-faith individuals representing broad concerns, as
$2,000 is not a prohibitive dollar amount and if the
initiative qualifies, then the fee is completely
refunded. Rather, this bill targets those bad actors
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who abuse the initiative process at the expense of the
state. SB 202 will restore the filing fee to a level
close to - but still less than - the level originally
sought in 1943, and more accurately reflect the actual
cost to the general fund.
2. Previous legislation . AB 1832 (Saldana) 2010 was
similar to this bill, but raised the filing fees
incrementally . The Governor vetoed AB 1832 stating in
relevant part: "While the argument may be made that
the current fee is no longer a sufficient deterrent, I
cannot support increasing the fee ten-fold. While
well-funded special interest groups would have no
problem paying the sharply increased fee, it will make
it more difficult for citizen groups to qualify an
initiative."
POSITIONS
Sponsor: Author
Support: None received
Oppose: Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association
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