Get out and Vote (and do your homework if you live in SF)

First: If you don’t know where to vote, ask google: http://maps.google.com/vote

Wow, for San Franciscans going to the polls this year, there is quite a lot of homework you have to do before hand – more than any other year in recent SF history.

San Fran currently has 22 props on the ballet, add that to the 12 props on the CA State ballot, along with your district supervisors, state assembly, congressional senator and other local candidates, and you’re looking at a 20min exam just to vote (let alone any reading you may want to do before hand).

At a local skateshop, I came across a pamphlet for the ‘League of Pissed Off Voters‘, which actually seems to have some pretty good suggestion.  So if you want to skip the studying, grab a copy of their little yellow guide.  The full ‘phone-book’ version is online: http://theballot.org/2008/sf

So here are Vinnie’s 2008 picks: (which i picked before finding the League of Pissed off Voters, and noticed I was pretty much in line with their picks, they even made some good points to switch my own argument at times)

One of the more important props is Prop 8 to eliminate rights of same-sex couples.  Now my personal belief is that the word ‘marriage’ having a religious connotation mucks up this whole debate, but civil rights are fundamentally, vote No on Prop 8.

State Props
1A: YES on High Speed Trains
2: YES on fair treatment to farm animals
3: NO on the fish children’s hospitals bond
4: YES on Parental Notification on a minor’s abortion
5: YES on rehab instead of prison for non-violent drug offenses
6: NO on more $1bil for criminal penalties
7: NO on badly written renewable energy (many env. groups oppose it)
8: NO on Gay Marriage Ban
9: NO on victims’ rights.  (the anecdotes they give don’t back their reasoning)
10: NO on alternative fuel (this promotes propane, not sustainable energy)
11: NO on redistricting (kinda hard to know if this will be beneficial)
12: YES to Vet bond

San Fran Props:
A: YES on Trauma center for Earthquakes (as we’ll be happier for it when we need it)
B: NO on affordable housing (subsidized housing doesn’t seem the best way to control housing prices, especially when it’s taken from other programs)
C: NO on prohibiting city employees serving on charters (too broad, for instance, firefighters couldn’t server on an environmental board)
D: YES on financing pier 70 (everybody approves)
E: NO on increasing num. signatures req’d for recall
F: NO on moving SF elections to even years only (will not save all the money, and if I think 34 props is big, imagine if another year was piled on!)
G: YES on allowing Retirement Credit for unpaid parental leave (many parties agree)
H: NO on clean energy deadlines and making all utils public (gov’t).  This moves PG&E into the gov’t.  What I would really like to see is what I had in NY.  One company delivered my electric (PG&E in this case), and I could choose where they bought my electrons from (wind, solar, etc. and pay a premium for that)
I: YES on Independent rate payer advocate for public utilities
J: YES on historic preservation commission
K: NO on decriminalized prostitution (have you walked through the tenderloin?)
L: YES on funding Community Justice Center
M: YES on prohibiting specific acs of tenant harassment (i was in this position 1 year ago)
N: Yes on changing real property transfer tax
O: Yes on replacing 911 fee as a voter controlled tax
P: NO on Changing composition of public transit board to the Mayor.  This wasn’t a clear call as MUNI and BART need to ‘connect as a system’ more then they are now, but I’ll follow the SF Bike Coalition on this one.
Q: YES on modifying the payroll expense tax
R: YES on memorializing the George W. Bush Sewage Plant
S: YES on budget set-asides identification of funds (i like to know where the money will come from for new polices)
T: Yes on free and low-cost substance abuse treatment
U: YES against funding illegal war in Iraq
V: No – Keep the military out of our schools, this tries to reverse an earlier decision

Local Candidates
District 9 Supervisor (the mission).  You pick in order of preference: 1. Mark Sanchez, 2. Eric Quezada, 3. David Campos
School Board: still to decide
Community College Board: still to decide
Superior Court Judge: Thomas Mellon (current)
BART Board: Tom Radulovich (current)

National:
President: Obama
Congress: Cindy Sheehan (cause she’s an independent and a strong critic of the war)  I’m not happy with Pelosi saying "impeachment is ‘off the table’"