A Story About Proposition A From

The Private Problem Behind Prop. A's Public Silence

By WILL CARLESS

Monday, Oct. 13, 2008 | Mayor Jerry Sanders and county Supervisor Greg Cox stood in the middle of a parched patch of city parkland Thursday afternoon and made brief pitches for Proposition A, a ballot measure that would impose a parcel tax on county residents to pay for increased fire protection.

The quick pledges of support for the proposition, both of which were tacked onto the end of speeches about general fire preparedness, seemed like afterthoughts and are largely indicative of an ongoing malaise that appears to have enveloped the ballot measure. Considering that the proposition has the potential to revolutionize fire protection in a county ravaged recently by wildfire, its promotion has been notably lackluster in the two months since it was approved for the ballot.

The absence of a bells-and-whistles effort to promote the proposition is especially puzzling considering that even its staunchest proponents admit it's facing a steep uphill battle. Proposition A needs a two-thirds vote to succeed, a tough call at the best of times, but in the midst of a plummeting economy, with a ballot already stuffed with tax-raising proposals, the measure needs all the cheerleaders it can get.

While the campaign for Proposition A, such as it is, strives to portray the measure as having the broad base of support it needs to succeed, interviews with a half-dozen high-ranking officials intimately involved in its creation revealed a different reality about the ballot measure's popularity and its chances of success.

Those officials said Proposition A is significantly unpopular behind closed doors and is almost certainly destined for failure because it was ill-conceived and rushed to completion at a treacherous time for new tax measures.

They said the reluctance by officials to embrace the proposition is also intrinsically tied to the unpopularity of the man widely considered its creator: County Supervisor Ron Roberts. Roberts has alienated his colleagues on the Board of Supervisors, who only reluctantly approved putting the proposition on the ballot, the officials said, and his stewardship of the proposition, and other fire-related issues, has irked many within the local firefighting community.

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