Jose Luis Magana / AP Photo; AP Photo
California's ballot is often crowded with measures known as citizen initiatives. But many of the citizens whose causes will come before voters Tuesday are not everyday Californians.
International financier George Soros wants to change drug laws. Computer technology titan Henry T. Nicholas III -- who has been indicted on federal fraud and drug charges -- is pushing two measures seeking tougher penalties for criminals and expanded rights for victims.
Oilman turned alternative-fuels investor T. Boone Pickens is pushing subsidies for cars that run on substances other than oil. And Peter Sperling, one of the founders of the highly profitable Phoenix University system, is the financial force behind another green- energy pursuit.
Ballot measures: An article in Section A on Saturday about billionaires sponsoring state propositions on the Tuesday ballot was accompanied by one wrong photograph. The man identified in the caption as Henry T. Nicholas III, who is backing Propositions 6 and 9, was actually Henry Samueli. Nicholas is pictured here. The Times regrets the error.
Never before has such a large assortment of the extremely wealthy placed their pet projects on the statewide ballot. Five of the dozen statewide measures facing voters in this election have billionaire sponsors.
All of them are among the Forbes 400 richest Americans. Each has spent millions to get his issue on the ballot.
The ability of the wealthy to bankroll ballot measures, paying for petition signatures and advertising campaigns, has been increasingly on display in California. Two years ago, for example, Hollywood producer Steven Bing dumped $48 million into an unsuccessful effort to raise taxes on oil to pay for alternative fuels.
But the size of this year's crop of billionaire initiatives is troubling, according to some.
"Our initiative process has been completely corrupted from the populist idea of people taking matters into their own hands when the Legislature is not doing its job," said Assemblyman Mark Leno (D-San Francisco).
For the moguls, the attraction to the ballot is simple.
The investment of a few million dollars can redirect billions of dollars in taxpayer money and upend statutes that have been on the books for decades. Even though the odds of success are long, the cost is relatively small for a person with a billion dollars or more.
"It is an opportunity to make powerful and effective change in one fell swoop," said Ethan Nadelmann, executive director of the Drug Policy Alliance Network, which used $1.4 million donated by Soros to put Proposition 5 on the ballot and promote it.
That measure would dramatically change the way nonviolent drug offenders are treated. Hundreds of millions of additional dollars will be spent on rehabilitation programs if it passes, and inmates will be given time off their sentences for participating in those programs.
