First of two parts
(See pdf here.)
[img]1154|right|Meghan Sahli-Wells||no_popup[/img]Three enterprising UCLA students last evening at the City Council meeting unfurled a proposal being circulated throughout the state that they say would reform the perceived unfairness of 36-year-old Prop. 13.
While this proposal may be unique, it joins a lengthy parade of putative reforms that have been floated, unsuccessfully, since the afternoon that 13 passed.
Although some persons in Council Chambers understood the students’ plan to be tailored specifically for Culver City, it was not.
Asserting that large corporations have gotten away with the taxing equivalent of homicide, the UCLA undergrads actually were asking the Council to endorse a plan they hope to place on a statewide ballot.
By their scheme, a substantive burden of taxes by Californians would shift from common persons, as the students described them, to giant companies they claim have been benefitting from “unfair loopholes” since 1978.
In rapid order, Councilmen Jim Clarke, Andy Weissman and Mayor Meghan Sahli-Wells endorsed the suggestion to at least formally study the latest reform at an upcoming meeting.
Mr. Clarke told the newspaper than rather than sketching in outline of changes, before he votes on Culver City stance, he needs to understand the impact on large hometown corporations such as Sony and Symantec.
Most attractive to Mayor Sahli-Wells is the notion of potentially – and that is a dynamite term – of evening the taxing score by tightening or vanquishing loopholes for giant firms.
Makers of the reform claim their plan would net the state $6 billion.
(To be continued)
