Sacramento Bee: Field Poll finds strong support remains for Proposition 13

Prop. 13 still highly popular, poll finds

By David Siders

The Sacramento Bee

Published: Friday, Sep. 23, 2011 - 12:00 am | Page 1A

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Occasional rumblings around the Capitol about changing Proposition 13 aren't likely to amount to much anytime soon: The landmark tax-limiting measure is about as widely popular today as when it passed in 1978, according to a new Field Poll.

By a greater than 2-to-1 ratio, with 63 percent support, California voters would endorse the measure if it were up for a vote again today, according to the poll.

"It's still the third rail of California politics," poll director Mark DiCamillo said. "It's really an untouchable. Tinkering with Proposition 13 would probably be done at a politician's own peril."

Approved by a 65 percent to 35 percent margin 33 years ago, Proposition 13 drastically reduced property taxes and made it more difficult for lawmakers to raise taxes in general.

The level of support slipped slightly in later years, from as low as 50 percent in 1991 to 57 percent in 2008, and politicians seeking to raise revenue in a withering economy occasionally considered trying to change it.

The poll suggests how difficult that might be: Though support among Republicans is greatest, majorities of Democrats, Republicans and independent voters all support the measure, as do majorities of both renters and homeowners, regardless of how long ago they bought their homes.

"To me, our government offices, the government that represents us, should have to stay within a budget," said Bonnie Monroe, 61, a retired warehouse worker and independent voter from Lindsay. "They have got to learn to live within their damn means."

Gov. Jerry Brown, who is expected to ask voters next year to raise taxes, has kept away from proposing any changes to Proposition 13.

"Those are things I have not proposed myself, being generally aware of what voters are thinking," the Democratic governor told The Bee on Thursday. "Government has a lot of explaining to do to the people, and unless we can demonstrate a higher level of effectiveness, it would be very hard to get the people to give us new taxes."

In the most recent, high-profile example of a politician who felt otherwise, Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa told the Sacramento Press Club this summer that California should reverse nonresidential parts of Proposition 13, taxing commercial property at higher levels and lowering taxes on homes.

"Gov. Brown, I say, we need to have the courage to test the voltage in some of these so-called 'third-rail' issues, beginning with Prop. 13," Villaraigosa said. "We need to strengthen Prop. 13 and get back to the original idea of protecting homeowners."

But a plurality of California voters for the first time since the proposition's passage not only support the measure but oppose amending it to permit commercial property owners to be taxed at a higher rate. By a 50 percent to 41 percent margin, voters oppose such a change, according to the poll.

"The issue here is the economy," DiCamillo said. "In the environment we're in, there's resistance to tax increases because there's this view that it's going to dampen the economy further."

A majority of voters also oppose changing Proposition 13 to let the state Legislature increase taxes either by a simple majority vote or a 55 percent majority vote, rather than the two-thirds supermajority that is required, the poll found.

The poll is likely to cheer taxpayer advocates. Jon Coupal, president of the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association, called it evidence that "touching Prop. 13 is a non-starter." He said Democrats considering a campaign for higher taxes "have easier places to go than Prop. 13 ... . I would say this really sends a signal that messing with Prop. 13 should not be a part of any tax reform."

Brown, when he was governor before in 1978, campaigned against Proposition 13. But when the measure passed, he embraced it so passionately that Howard Jarvis, perhaps Proposition 13's most visible backer, endorsed Brown's re-election bid. Brown said Thursday that he has no plans to change course.

"That's been my position since Howard Jarvis endorsed me for election in 1978," he said.

David Hickman, a graduate student and adjunct history instructor at UC Davis, said he is tired of laws allowing corporations to keep their tax rates relatively low. The 37-year-old Democrat said he would "certainly vote against the corporate provisions" of the proposition and would consider changes to the homeowner provision if it were up for a vote now.

"It's part of the larger issue of how local government has been defunded, and I think it would be a good idea to revisit it," Hickman said. "Living in Davis, where you see people that have kept properties in their families for decades and decades and are paying much lower tax rates than their neighbors are, but are getting similar services, I think there's inequality in that."