Get Ready For Voting

By early September, campaigns for candidates and ballot propositions will be underway, and we'll start seeing political ads in our mailboxes, on television, and everywhere else. To help you sort out the state propositions, Progressives Club steering committee member and author David D. Schmidt will be speaking on September 14 at the East Rec. Center on Proposition 4, the California Fair Elections Act, and the most controversial six of the other 14 state propositions. Some of these propositions, if passed, could have a transformational impact on California and the nation -- just as Proposition 13 did back in 1978.

David will speak on who's funding these campaigns, who's supporting and opposing them, and what the propositions would do.

They include Prop. 3, to extend the high earners' income tax, Prop. 4, to repeal the ban on public campaign financing, Prop. 39, a strict voter ID mandate, and Props. 40, 41, 42, and 43, pertaining to the Billionaire Tax and local tax initiatives.

David is North Bay Regional Volunteer Coordinator for the California Clean Money Campaign, former editor of a nationwide newsletter on ballot propositions, and author of Citizen Lawmakers: The Ballot Initiative Revolution. His new book, San Francisco Bay Area: An Environmental History, published last November by Backcountry Press, has won the California Book Awards Gold Medal for Contributions to Publishing.

As always, bring a snack to share and a beverage of your choice.