43

Why Thrive LA supports 43

Proposition 43 amends the California Constitution to require a two-thirds supermajority vote to pass any citizen-initiated local special tax. Under current law, government-proposed special taxes already require two-thirds approval, but a loophole allows special interest groups to place their own tax measures on the ballot and pass them with a bare majority. Proposition 43 closes that loophole and creates one consistent standard. It also constitutionally prohibits any new ad valorem property taxes beyond the 1% cap established by Proposition 13. Every tax reduces economic activity. Every new fee, surcharge, or transfer tax makes it more expensive to build, hire, and invest in California. The citizen-initiative loophole has allowed well-organized interest groups to exploit low-turnout elections and impose punitive taxes on residents and businesses with slim majorities. The result has been policy disasters like Los Angeles's Measure ULA, a transfer tax on property sales above $5 million that passed with just 58% of the vote. ULA cratered commercial real estate transactions in Los Angeles, discouraged housing investment, and failed to deliver meaningful results on homelessness. Under Proposition 43's two-thirds threshold, ULA would not have passed. That is exactly the point. Taxes that reshape an entire city's economy should require broad, durable consensus, not a bare majority assembled in a single election cycle. Government-proposed special taxes have faced this standard for decades. There is no principled reason citizen-initiated special taxes should get a lower bar. The loophole didn't empower voters; it empowered the organized groups that draft ballot measures and fund signature-gathering campaigns. Proposition 43 levels the playing field and forces tax proponents to make a case convincing enough to earn support from two-thirds of voters. This measure does not cut a single dollar of existing funding. It does not block any tax from ever passing. It simply requires that new special taxes clear the same threshold regardless of who puts them on the ballot. Local governments retain every tool they have today: general taxes still pass with a simple majority, and bond measures and government-proposed special taxes operate under the same rules they always have. What changes is that taxpayers get the same constitutional protection whether a tax is proposed by City Hall or by an outside advocacy group. Vote yes on Proposition 43. It is the strongest taxpayer protection measure on this ballot.