California E&S Insurance

A random SF redditor's practical voting guide for November 2022 election **EDIT: How about if all the (many) silent downvoters comment instead, about where/why they disagree with me, so there could be a healthy exchange of ideas that helps others form their own viewpoints? Wouldn't that be useful?** I’ve seen a bunch of posts recently of folks looking for opinions on specific propositions, or for more general voter guides. I spent a few hours the other day doing my own research and filling out my ballot, so thought I’d share my take with any who might have similar positions, since I would have found it helpful myself at least as a starting point. Everyone’s obviously free to vote however they choose and I’m no policy expert, so take this for what it’s worth -- just a bunch of hot takes from someone who considers herself a pragmatic Democrat, who cares most about competency in her elected officials (aka was disgusted by Gabriela Lopez's antics in the name of 'progressivism'), who enthusiastically voted to recall Chesa Boudin for sheer inability to perform the basic functions of his job), who cares about SF getting more housing by any means possible, having less corrupt bureaucracy, and less crime/grossness on our streets. The resources I relied on most heavily for my own research were [CalMatters](https://calmatters.org/california-voter-guide-2022/) (nonpartisan - they just try to factually present both sides), [GrowSF](https://growsf.org/voter-guide/?gclid=CjwKCAjw79iaBhAJEiwAPYwoCBOS7X8pmdydigrB4jyVsXxi_7mk9JyTUObivyqBc0m2BQzOO1MmOhoCivIQAvD_BwE#prop-a) (YIMBY pro-housing organization), and [SPUR](https://www.spur.org/voter-guide/2022-11) (policy wonks for good governance). Feel free to debate & discuss in comments - the more informed and engaged voters are, the better, IMO. ​ |Position|My vote|Rationale| |:-|:-|:-| |Gov|Newsom|| |Lt Gov|Kounalakis|Done it for 4 yrs and hasn’t messed up; opponent much less qualified| |Sec of State|Weber|Incumbent who hasn’t messed up. Also strong academic credentials| |Controller|Chen (R)|Republican BUT seems highly qualified, and is a Romney-style Republican, not a Trump guy. Qualified academic and I think it might actually be good to have a more independent watchdog on how California spends its money. The Democratic opponent seems fine too, but more beholden to the Party and not quite as strong a resume for the role, IMO.| |Treasurer|Ma|Incumbent who hasn’t messed up, has maintained strong CA budget surplus| |Attorney General|Bonta|Democratic appointee. Pro housing and is trying to hold cities like SF accountable when they reject housing proposals for stupid reasons.| |Insurance Commissioner|Lara|They both suck, but Lara sucks slightly less?| |Board of Equalization|Verbica (R)|This position is pretty meaningless but at least Verbica made some specific statements about process improvement type things he’d try to do; Lieber was super vague about doing anything at all| |Senator|Padilla|I’m not giving a CA Senate seat to a Republican| |Rep|Pelosi|Like her or not, she's been getting shit done for the Dems for a long time| |State Assembly, District 17|Haney|Voted for Haney over Campos in the earlier elections too. Haney is more pro-housing (Campos has voted NIMBY in the past)| |Various justices & Supreme Court justices|Yes to all|I saw no good reason not to approve them all.| |Superintendent of Public Instruction|Thurmond|Christensen's written statements make him seem like a right wing nutter| |Board of Ed|Hsu, Motamedi, Weissman-Ward|They're competent and not part of Gabriela Lopez's ridiculousness. Note that Hsu had some controversy recently when she said that "unstable family environments" and "lack of parental encouragement to focus on or value learning" are factors in worse black/brown student performance, and Lopez et al / NAACP called her racist for it. My take is that she worded it poorly and failed to acknowledge the structural/historical disenfranchisement that is the underlying problem, but I didn't find it sufficiently problematic to think she can't do a good job in the role.| |Community College Board (4y term)|Hurabiell, Yee, Rizzo|Yee is experienced professor/dean at City College and has practical ideas on improving finances (i.e. consolidating some classes). Hurabiell is on Georgetown Board of Regents and did apparently a good job as President of the Presidio Trust, and ran finance/audits there. Rizzo is long-tenured and maybe with the other 2 there to push for improvements will be useful in helping execute.| |Community College Board (2yr term)|Green|Mayor Breed appointed him, I'm fine letting him have a shot at it| |DA|Jenkins as #1 - I'm not ranking anyone else|She’s done reasonably enough since being appointed - prosecuting anti-Asian crimes, drug dealers, etc. in a way that feels responsive to the driving factors behind the Boudin recall. Hamasaki is clearly a nutjob (look up his past Twitter rants, which he's deleted but are still out there). Chenier can’t spell or write properly but would grudgingly rank him #2 if needed. Veronese seems like more of Chesa Boudin's failed philosophy & policies.| |Public Defender|Raju|His only opponent quit the public defender office to go work for Boudin| |Prop 1, abortion protection|YES|Probs unnecessary in CA but IMO it doesn't hurt to enshrine it that much more in the constitution| |Prop 26, in-person gambling/sports betting in tribal casinos|NO|Pure regulatory capture / creating an unfair monopoly. I also think it's wrong if tribes were able to circumvent the state legislature (who should make laws on things like this) through a proposition w/ misleading marketing and lots of money.| |Prop 27, online sports betting w/ tribal casino partnerships|NO|More regulatory capture / monopolistic behavior. Shouldn't be a prop, should be state legislature| |Prop 28, spend another $1B on arts/music education in public schools|YES|Was hesitant since I don't like budgeting being done through props, but it's <0.5% of the general fund budget (not new funds) being dedicated to arts & music, which I guess is a good thing.| |Prop 29: kidney dialysis centers requiring more doctors|NO|for the love of god, can we block the dialysis worker unions from constantly shoving this onto the ballot? they're just using propositions as a weapon for bargaining and out of principle I hate it. (on the actual prop: it seems like this would not improve patient care and would make dialysis more expensive.)| |Prop 30, EV / wildfire funding from taxing people making >$2M|YES|I'm not making >$2M, so no new taxes from me (or most people). And some progressives don't like it because Lyft is a main funder and will benefit from the EV investment/infrastructure, but I think it's overall a good thing anyway. EV infrastructure is good for cities' futures.| |Prop 31, flavored tobacco ban|YES|This just maintains the ban on flavored tobacco that the CA legislature already enacted. I don't feel super strongly about this one but I'm not a smoker and I do believe that flavored vapes get more kids into smoking.| |Prop A, supplemental cost of living adjustment to city employees who retired before 1996|YES|It's just some small logistical thing that makes things more fair for a small portion of ex-retirees. Very little $ we're talking about here, a couple million, so whatever| |Prop B, tries to undo a previous prop that split Streets and Sanitations out from the corrupt/inept Department of Public Works|NO|Matt Haney led the push for the initial split. Feels stupid to undo it this quickly. And the DPW was a hot mess, so maybe the separation will help - but hasn't been enough time to see if it works or not yet| |Prop C, establish a Homeless Oversight Commission|HELL NO|Ugh. SF doesn't need any more graft or highly-paid homeless advocates siphoning away more money for nonprofits that aren't held accountable for improving any actual outcomes. We don't need a Commission, we need policies that work and accountability for how dollars are spent towards the problem| |Prop D, streamline housing approval for affordable housing|YES|Just build more already!!| |Prop E, a deceptive/confusing poison pill to kill Prop D|HELL NO|I hate how deceptive/misleading this is -- it's worded like it's supporting the same pro-housing stuff as Prop D, but it actually would just completely nullify Prop D.| |Prop F, reauthorize existing funding for libraries|YES|Public libraries are a treasure. This isn't any new tax or funding - just reauthorizes continuing their funding| |Prop G, redirect some general funds to public schools|YES|Eh, I was iffy since I don't agree with budgeting being done at the ballot, but more money for schools is a good thing Imo| |Prop H, consolidate election cycles to save the city some money|YES|just good governance. not too complicated| |Prop I: tries to undo the car-free JFK drive at Golden Gate Park|NO|I like the car-free JFK Drive. This prop would also cost SF a bunch of money (like $80M?) to maintain the Great Highway for cars| |Prop J: opposite of I, reaffirms / makes car-free JFK permanent|YES|I like car-free JFK drive| |Prop L: continues existing tax to fund public transit/MUNI|YES|It's not a new tax. Also, MUNI/transit already sucks - reducing their money will only make it worse, not better.| |Prop M: new prop tax on apartments vacant for 6 months|NO|This one was complicated, but GrowSF has the most educated take on it IMO. Basically SF's residential vacancy rate is already really low and it's a misleading narrative that the rents are high because everything is being held vacant. Also this prop only applies to big apartment buildings which obviously are already very incentivized to have low vacancy rates. GrowSF thinks this prop would actually *increase* property costs in the end| |Prop N: let city manage parking for JFK drive instead of subcontracting|YES|seems straightforward and uncontroversial| |Prop O: more property tax for SF homeowners to fund City College|NO|City College's problems aren't because of lack of funding. They've got other issues right now| ​

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  "title": "A random SF redditor's practical voting guide for November 2022 election",
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