Victories
Environment & Affordable Housing Saved
In 2008, The Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association (which demolished California's school funding with the infamous Prop 13) qualified an even more dangerous measure, Proposition 98, for the June ballot.
In the guise of protecting property owners, Prop 98 would have blocked most California zoning and environmental protections, halted critical work to fight global warming, and repealed all rent control and other affordable housing laws in California. Over 80% of the funding for Prop 98 came from large trailer park and rental property owners.
Corporate Power
Prop 98 was so broadly worded that corporations, developers, and real estate speculators could have used it to claim that any law restricting their activities and profits would be a 'taking' of 'property'. This could have invalidated almost all California laws protecting our communities, the environment, and consumers, from corporate greed and irresponsibility.
So in 2008, Our City joined with scores of other environmental, consumer and social justice groups in a coalition which organized to get the truth out about this deeply flawed measure.
The coalition was successful, and California voters rejected Proposition 98 by a landslide!