Joe Matthews praises Assemblyman Gatto's initiative reform efforts

The California Constitution has been amended over 500 times.

Joe Matthews is a Journalist and California Editor at Zócalo Public Square, Fellow at the Center for Social Cohesion at Arizona State University, and co-author of California Crackup: How Reform Broke the Golden State and How We Can Fix It (UC Press, 2010).

As one of the leading voices on how to fix California's broken  government structures, I am proud to receive recognition from him for my efforts at initiative reform.  Below is  short excerpt of an article he wrote last week at Fox and Hounds Daily.

Many California leaders and groups want to make this the year for reforming the initiative process. You’d think I’d be one of them. I've written two books that dealt in detail with the initiative process. I help run a global forum on direct democracy. I teach a class on the subject. I write about it constantly... 

...But I think “initiative reform,” as a concept, is something we shouldn't do. 

That doesn't mean there aren't good ideas out there. There are. 

Darrell Steinberg’s package of proposals makes a ton of sense. 

Assemblyman Mike Gatto has been advancing the smartest, most ambitious proposals on initiatives in recent years. 

The Think Long Committee for California has a very well-thought-out batch of proposals, with the hands-down best new idea on the subject (creating a group that could do long-term thinking and put measures directly on the ballot as an alternative to signatures)...

...So what’s the problem? Put simply: the initiative process can’t be reformed by itself....

You can read Joe Matthews' entire article by clicking HERE.


Mike Gatto is the Chairman of the Appropriations Committee of the California State Assembly.  He represents the cities of Burbank, Glendale, La Canada-Flintridge, La Crescenta, Montrose, the Los Angeles neighborhoods of Los Feliz, Silver Lake, Atwater Village, and portions of the Hollywood Hills and East Hollywood.   www.asm.ca.gov/gatto

Pasadena Star-News Editorial Board Supports Gatto Reform Efforts

A few days ago I posted an opinion-editorial entitled "The Martial Art of Subduing Special Interests."  The Op-Ed had originally appeared in the Glendale News Press back in December and apparently I wasnt' the only person thinking about reform.  I am happy to say that on the same day that my Op-Ed appeared, the editorial boards of both the Pasadena Star-News and the  San Bernardino Sun wrote editorials supporting my reform efforts and calling on Sacramento to do more.  

I will continue pushing for these important reforms this session.  If you think reforming ballot-box budgeting is important, I encourage you to write your state representatives and tell them to do something about it.  The text of the board's Editorial is below.

THIS has been a big year for political reform in California. Voters in districts drawn for the first time by an independent commission used the state's new open-primary system to elect a group of officeholders bound by redefined term limits.

There's hope these changes will have the intended effect of making lawmakers more representative of actual communities, less beholden to party extremists, and less shortsighted.

What might next year bring?

Plenty remains to be done to improve how the state is run. So let's narrow down the possibilities: The theme for the next round of reforms should be transparency.

Transparency is the

catchall word that political watchdogs use to describe some essential qualities of an effective government. All-too-rare features like openness, honesty and accountability. Things that let constituents know what their leaders are up to, that allow people to participate in the process.

Here are four ideas for promoting transparency. None is exactly new, and some have been proposed before and defeated. Which makes them overdue for action by reform-minded California lawmakers or by voters:

Expand disclosure of campaign contributors.

The November election highlighted the problem.

An Arizona-based nonprofit group, widely and accurately described as shadowy, sent $11 million to the campaigns against the Proposition 30 tax hikes and in favor of the Proposition 32 restrictions on unions' political power. Under current campaign finance laws, the source of the money didn't have to be revealed, leading critics to liken the maneuvers to money-laundering.

Voters must be allowed to know who is trying to influence elections, so they can figure out the real motives of initiative campaigns and candidates.

State Sen. Ted Lieu of Torrance is one of two legislators promoting bills that would tighten disclosure rules and increase penalties for breaking them. These would be good steps.

Related to this, Assemblyman Mike Gatto of Burbank has proposed requiring backers of voter initiatives to identify their top five campaign contributors in ballot pamphlets.

It's worth pursuing.

Rein in ballot-box budgeting.

California's budget problems are complicated by the creation of expensive state program through ballot initiatives. Here, too, Gatto is promising to continue to push to at least warn voters of the risk by requiring initiative campaigns to state how new programs would be funded.

End "gut and amend" legislating and other rush-job laws.

The gut-and-amend practice causes outrage one week per legislative cycle, during the days before the deadline for passing bills, but the anger hasn't lasted long enough to spur reform.

In August, Assemblyman Felipe Fuentes of Sylmar turned a Senate bill concerning vehicle pollution into a bill to give as many as 2million undocumented immigrants "safe harbor" in California. Though the bill didn't pass, it was an egregious example of an effort to completely alter a bill at the last minute to try to slide something unrelated through the Legislature.

Around the same time, a pension-reform bill was jammed through before lawmakers, let alone members of a concerned public, could figure out what as in it.

A remedy is to require bills to be made public at least 72 hours before lawmakers vote. This was among several reforms in Proposition 31, which voters rejected in November. The proposal deserves another chance.

End vote-switching.

The game-playing doesn't end after legislators cast their votes. Thanks to an Associated Press report, Californians now know how often members of the Assembly take advantage of rules allowing them to alter or add votes in the official record after the fact (more than 5,000 times this year). Sometimes there are legitimate reasons to do this, but usually the aim is to make their voting history more attractive to the public and party leaders.

Come election time, voters should be able to judge incumbents' performance in office in part by reviewing which bills they supported and opposed.

Not surprisingly, Assembly leaders have signaled they have no plan to forbid vote-switching. So, as with most good reforms, the impetus will have to come from the public itself.

These ideas are a start on the next round of California political reform. There will be more where they came from.

# # #

This Editorial originally appeared in the Pasadena Star-News.  You can read this editorial and more by visiting the Pasadena Star News HERE

Mike Gatto is the Chairman of the Appropriations Committee of the California State Assembly.  He represents the cities of Burbank, Glendale, La Canada-Flintridge, La Crescenta, Montrose, the Los Angeles neighborhoods of Los Feliz, Silver Lake, Atwater Village, and portions of the Hollywood Hills and East Hollywood.   www.asm.ca.gov/gatto  

LISTEN IN: Assemblyman Mike Gatto hopes Article 5 can overturn Citizens United

LISTEN IN: Assemblyman Gatto talks about his efforts to overturn Citizens United on KPCC's Airtalk with Larry Mantle

AirTalk | December 12th, 2012

Plenty of people were unhappy with the Supreme Court’s 2010 decision in Citizen’s United, which resulted in a constitutional amendment that allows corporations and unions the ability unlimited spending on political campaigns.  Even staunch Republican supporters had second thoughts after heavily funded super-PACS dominated campaign dollars in the last election.

But according to Los Angeles Assemblyman Michael Gatto, there is a way to reverse the decision, hidden in the constitution itself.  Article 5 directs Congress to call a convention for proposing Amendments to the constitution, if two-thirds of the states agree.  Any proposed amendment would then need to be ratified by three-quarters of the legislature. Gatto hopes this little-known corner the constitution could undo Citizens United. He’s introduced a resolution that he hopes will get the ball rolling in California, with other states to follow.

Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images

Laird Monahan stands on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial next to a giant banner printed with the Preamble to the United States Constitution during a demonstration against the Supreme Court's Citizens United ruling on the National Mall October 20, 2010 in Washington, DC.

Article 5 has never been used successfully, and constitutional law experts aren’t sure it’s a good idea.  The problem?  Once the constitutional convention has been called, it’s not clear that the proposals will be limited to just one - any number of amendments could be thrown in the mix. This process, they warn, could lead to open season on the Constitution, putting the First Amendment and other beloved protections up for grabs.

Is the use of Article 5 to stop Citizens United appropriate - or even feasible? Should California lead the way in this effort?  Or are we opening up a can of constitutional worms?

 Guests:

Michael Gatto, California Assemblyman for 43rd District,  representing the cities of Burbank, Glendale, and parts of Los Angeles including Los Feliz, North Hollywood, Silver Lake, Toluca Lake, Valley Glen, and Van Nuys.

Justin Levitt, associate professor of law at Loyola Law School

Even a Tiny Initiative Reform Can't Make It Past the Governor

By Joe Mathews |  Friday, Oct 5, 2012  |  Updated 9:13 AM PDT

Initiative reform is an unpopular cause, and an uphill battle.

Assemblyman Mike Gatto, a Burbank Democrat, has been one of the few lawmakers foolhardy enough to attempt it. And this session he appeared to have achieved some success with AB 2220.

This was modest with a capital "M." But useful. The legislation tried to grab the attention of voters by letting them know something very important about their votes on initiatives: that when they do something by initiative, it can't be changed. This permanence -- you could call it inflexibility -- distinguishes California's initiative process from how the initiative is used around the country and the world.

Gatto specifically would have instructed the non-partisan legislative analyst to add one paragraph to the ballot pamphlet warning that the measure would provide an increase in revenues to fund new or existing programs, create a new fund, or create or change a funding formula for programs. In essence, this is a warning label that fiscal decisions are being made that will be hard to undo. An example of one of the possible warnings:

"Unless changed by a future voter-approved ballot measure, this initiative would permanently dedicate state funding to the program(s) identified, and these funds would not be available to meet other responsibilities of the state."

This legislation made it through the legislature. But it couldn't make it through Gov. Jerry Brown, who has been a political reform skeptic and has seen the initiative process as a means to the end. He vetoed it.

His explanation? He wrote in a veto message that, while he shared Gatto's concern that voters should understand what their vote on an initiative means, he wasn't sure if additional warning was all that helpful, since the legislative analysis already provides information in the ballot pamphlet.

Let's hope Gatto tries again.

Lead Prop Zero blogger Joe Mathews is California editor at Zocalo Public Square, a fellow at Arizona State University’s Center for Social Cohesion, and co-author of California Crackup: How Reform Broke the Golden State and How We Can Fix It (University of California, 2010).

# # #

Read this article and more at NBC Bay Area by clicking HERE

Mike Gatto is the Chairman of the Appropriations Committee of the California State Assembly.  He represents the cities of Burbank, Glendale, and the Los Angeles neighborhoods of Los Feliz and Silver Lake.  E-mail Mike at: assemblymember.gatto@assembly.ca.gov, or call (818) 558-3043.

Website of Assemblyman Mike Gatto: www.asm.ca.gov/gatto

KCET Praises Assemblyman Mike Gatto's efforts to strengthen voting requirements for Constitutional Amendments

California Constitution, Altered Over 500 Times; U.S. Constitution, Only 27

by Jessica Levinson - September 3, 2012 10:00 AM

Last week our state's lower legislative house rejected a bill that would have made it harder to qualify and approve of initiatives that change California's constitution. Assemblyman Mike Gatto, a Democrat from Los Angeles, sponsored the bill that would have made an enormous amount of sense. Let's hope it comes back again, successfully passes both legislative houses, and is signed by the Governor. Here's why.

It is distressingly easy to amend our state constitution through a disturbingly broken process -- the ballot initiative process. A constitution should be a basic governing document. It should be difficult to alter it. It should be altered only after an open, deep, and thorough debate. Ours is not; it has been amended well over 500 times. It is one of the most bloated constitutions in modern history. Compare our state constitution, in existence for 133 years, to our federal constitution, in existence for 223 years: It has been amended only 27 times.

The ballot initiative process simply makes it far too easy to propose, qualify, and pass citizen-initiated laws. Gatto's bill would have required more voter signatures to qualify initiatives. Further, his proposal would have required that constitutional amendments pass by a vote of 55 percent of voters taking part in the election in which the measure appeared on the ballot.

Gatto's proposal was quite rationale. Constitutional amendments should not pass by a simple majority of those who show up to the polls in any given election.

We live in a representative democracy. The ballot initiative process was designed as a safety valve for citizens when the legislative process failed to function properly. Now, because the initiative process is largely dominated by the same special interests we created the process to guard against, both the legislative and initiative processes are in need of serious reform.

Gatto's proposal would have been a step in the right direction.

Jessica Levinson writes about the intersection of law and government. She is an Associate Clinical Professor at Loyola Law School. 

Read this article and more at KCET HERE

# # #

Mike Gatto is the Chairman of the Appropriations Committee of the California State Assembly.  He represents the cities of Burbank, Glendale, and the Los Angeles neighborhoods of Los Feliz and Silver Lake.  E-mail Mike at: assemblymember.gatto@assembly.ca.gov, or call (818) 558-3043.

Website of Assemblyman Mike Gatto: www.asm.ca.gov/gatto

Gatto’s Reform To Fix California’s Constitutional Amendment Process Clears Key Hurdle

CRAIG SHERWOOD, JULY 6, 2012   Tuesday, Assemblyman Mike Gatto’s (D-Los Angeles) Assembly Constitutional Amendment (ACA) 10, an important reform measure to protect the sanctity of California’s constitution, passed the Assembly Committee on Elections and Redistricting by a vote of 4-1.

The measure, part of Gatto’s package of constitutional reforms, seeks greater parity between the U.S. Constitution and California’s when it comes to the amendment process. The U.S. Constitution has been amended 27 times in 223 years, whereas California’s Constitution has been amended 521 times in roughly half the time, requiring only a simple majority of the electorate to amend.

“I would submit that one of the reasons our country has not been torn apart by strife is that, to amend our governing document, you need consensus.  California’s Constitution has been treated by special interests as just another statute, subject to the temporary whims of the majority of voters who show up and vote in any given year,” said Gatto.

ACA 10 seeks closer parity with the Federal Constitution in two ways. First, it would require a 55% majority to approve a new initiative constitutional amendment. Second, it would add a geographic-distribution requirement for signature gathering among the state’s far-flung and diverse Senate districts.

“These changes would ensure that amendments to our state’s constitution reflect the desires of the entire state.  It will also force those with the idea du jour to actually go discuss it with their fellow citizens across the state.”

Only 24 states even have an initiative process. Half of those states have similar geographic-distribution requirements, several require that votes cast far surpass the simple majority threshold, and six have gone as far as to forbid initiatives from amending their constitutions.

“A constitution should be a sacred, hallowed document that contains fundamental governing principles and rights.  I expect to have the support of my colleagues, who believe in the sanctity of the Federal Constitution and the wisdom of our Founding Fathers, to support taking these steps to ensure California’s Constitution is similarly protected,” said Gatto.  “No right is permanent, and no reform has any teeth, if it can be repealed at the very next election.”

ACA 10 now heads to the Assembly Appropriations Committee for consideration.

Article from Burbank N Beyond, read this article at Burbank N Beyond HERE

# # #

Mike Gatto is the Assistant Speaker Pro Tempore of the California State Assembly.  He represents the cities of Burbank, Glendale, and parts of Los Angeles, including Los Feliz, North Hollywood, Silver Lake, Toluca Lake, Valley Glen, and Van Nuys.  He has served in the Assembly since June 2010.  E-mail Mike at: assemblymember.gatto@assembly.ca.gov, or call (818) 558-3043.

Website of Assemblyman Mike Gatto: www.asm.ca.gov/gatto