Afew hours after California voters approved his Proposition 13 tax-cut measure on June 6, 1978, a bibulous and exultant Howard Jarvis dropped his pants for the benefit of a few reporters gathered in his suite at the L.A. Biltmore Hotel.
A reporter had asked Jarvis why he was limping, so his ostensible reason was to show a large, ugly bruise, which he'd suffered in a fall a few days before, on his ample, boxer-clad behind. The surprise gesture, however, also afforded the earthy and profane Jarvis a chance to display his contempt for the press and, by extension, the political class that had mocked him and opposed his cherished measure.
Thirty years later, the ghost of Jarvis and his legacy initiative still aim antipathy, scorn and disdain at California's government and its leaders. Proposition 13 was the first, and most far-reaching, in a cascade of political decisions over the last three decades that have shaped the dysfunctional structure of governance in the state.
Simply put, California today is ungovernable.
As state and local officials struggle to weather the state's fiscal crisis, they wield power with the damaged machinery of a patchwork government system that lacks accountability, encourages stalemate and drifts but cannot be steered.
In this system, elected leaders carry responsibility, but not authority, for far-reaching policies about public revenues and resources. That's not governance -- it's reactive management of a deeply flawed status quo.
Here is a look at six key factors that have made California impossible to govern. Proposition 13: The fiscal effect of Proposition 13 itself is only part of the damage the initiative did to California. Even worse have been the methods Capitol politicians devised to try to lessen the measure's financial impact. After Proposition 13 passed, then-Gov. Jerry Brown and the Democrat-dominated Legislature realigned -- "tangled" would be more accurate -- the relationship between state and local governments by effectively shifting control of remaining property tax revenue to Sacramento. In a crisis atmosphere, they radically transformed California's political landscape, taking power and responsibility for health, welfare, schools and other local services away from city councils, boards of supervisors and school boards, thereby establishing today's chaotic maze of overlapping jurisdiction, which defies efforts at accountability.
