Report of the Week

In this study, Molly Milligan of the Center for Governmental Studies analyzes voter registration data and recent primary election results to estimate the potential effects of the passage of Proposition 14, the open primary initiative on the June 2010 ballot. Among other findings, her analysis predicts that one-third of congressional and state legislative primary elections could result in general election run-offs between two candidates of the same-party and that the change could make elections more expensive.

Returning to the theme of their last report - "The Billion Dollar Money Train" - this report from the California Fair Political Practices Committee describes what could be called the cars of that train. Unions, corporations, Indian tribes and trade associations are all included in this list of the 25 biggest spenders in California politics and their beneficiaries, a stark illustration of the influence of special interest money in Sacramento politics.

California is a state of many distinct regions. To give citizens a voice on regional issues and to reinvigorate California's Legislature, the state's central institution of self-government, we propose Personalized Full Representation for the 21st Century (PFR21), a system of representation by means of regionally based legislative elections that will allow the state'scitizens to set the agenda for their regions and for the state as a whole.

PPIC's At Issue series focuses on issues important for California now and in the future. In this issue, PPIC research fellow Eric McGhee discusses three charges often brought against the California Legislature—loss of competence, increasing partisan gridlock, and declining efficiency—and three types of reform aimed at addressing those shortcomings: relaxing term limits, transferring redistricting from the legislature to an independent commission, and reducing the supermajority requirement for the budget.