Taking The Initiative On Traffic - A New Twist On Stopping Growth

Ventura County, home of the SOAR (Save Our Agricultural Resources) measure and slow growth politics may be trailblazing for a new political tool designed to further limit growth -- Ballot measures restricting growth by tying development to traffic congestion.

This is an interesting development for the key reason that Ventura County is recognized as a bellweather county in state politics.  It is largely a "quality of life" Republican swing county (we used to call them "country club" Republicans). It's a coastal county that typically votes for the winner of Gubernatorial and Presidential contests -- whether Democrat or Republican. As such, this county is an unusually good barometer of how well an initiative will fare across the state.  Ventura votes for environmentally friendly issues, is largely slow growth, anti-tax and elects a mix of centrists and conservatives at most levels of government. In other words, if you want to pass an initiative in California -- poll it in Ventura County first.

That may be what proponents of two new measures are doing for next November -- and it's curiously reminiscent of tactics tried in the past...

A few years ago Senator Sheila Kuehl (representing communities just south of Ventura County) crafted a nifty and seemingly innocent enough piece of legislation that would essentially require a homebuilder to identify a certain amount of water supply before actually breaking ground on the houses they were trying to build. Sounded reasonable enough -- common sense would dictate that there must be a source of water if you were going to have people live there (though it's amusing to ponder what Bugsy Siegel would've said had Nevada passed something similar while he was breaking ground for Las Vegas). 

Along that line of thought come two initiatives in Ventura County designed to essentially stop growth under the rubric of traffic congestion. Again, a simple enough concept that may be hiding a larger agenda -- stopping, or at least slowing growth.

As strong proponents of the initiative process, we at CCN believe that there is nothing inherently right or wrong about someone's belief in a 'growth' or 'no growth' philosophy. We are however stronger proponents of honesty and truth in the public square.  Knowing that traffic concerns are polling higher than K - 12 education in some parts of the state (a sure sign of the apocalypse?), it's little wonder that placing your morning commute at the forefront of any debate is becoming best practice for campaigns both local and beyond.

But if you don’t want growth, why not just say so?  We're not Pollyannaish here at CCN, but If you don’t want a new Home Depot in town, make your case based on that.

Most importantly, recent history demonstrates that voter tend to know when you're trying to pull the wool over their eyes -- and they very often resent it and turn a blind eye to your cause, whether they may have been inclined to support it or not.

If you're against growth (or Home Depots or rent control) thats fine -- just say so and let the chips fall where they may.

Initiatives are a part of the California political tradition - so when will the politicians finally realize that they're not dealing with dumb voters?