Posted by Joe, a resident of the Downtown neighborhood, on May 19, 2009 at 11:54 am

It always seems to come down to the Unions. Not enough citizens know just how badly they are ruining California. Arnold tried to stop them in 2005 but they ganged up on him and he lost. When these props. are defeated today, the Governor needs to make a public statement and educate any of the voting public who are not aware of the 3 point/3% retiremnt rule that the unions hold the state hostage with. This is our state, not the unions and it is time we rune them out instead of them running business and citizens out.

Posted by amy, a resident of the Del Prado neighborhood, on May 19, 2009 at 1:40 pm

Thank you for posting this WSJ article!!!

I'm voting NO on all which I hope will also send a strong message to Mr. Schwartzenkennedy and his liberal legislators.

(PS...Vote NO in June too!)

Posted by Concerne, a resident of the Another Pleasanton neighborhood neighborhood, on May 19, 2009 at 4:30 pm

I am very optimistic reading all the blogs that the people are finally waking up to the tyranny of the Public Sector unions. We are finally reaching a major showdown. Don't back up. This is HIGH NOON.

Posted by Get out of the wagon, a resident of the Another Pleasanton neighborhood neighborhood, on May 19, 2009 at 5:12 pm

Locked and loaded! :)

Posted by what to fund not what to cut, a member of the Vintage Hills Elementary School community, on May 19, 2009 at 6:30 pm

I'm with concern and get out the wagon. NO MORE TAX INCREASES or games around the budget, this is our future.

the debate should be "what can we fund" not "what should we cut"

time to start from scratch

Public unions have long been out of step with the private sector in terms of pay, benefits, pensions, work rules, etc.

General fund costs have gone up 35% since Arnold took over, but don't blame him, my guess the increase is due to contractual agmts with the public unions and their pensions, and well, ok the vehicle license fee being revolked. Would appreciate any facts on this increase of 35% if someone has it.

Posted by On the same page, a resident of the Country Fair neighborhood, on May 19, 2009 at 8:57 pm

Agree people are just begining to wake up up after being in a deep sleep re: unions and our federal and state government that is wayyyyyyy out of control. The only problem I see now is that it may be too late. People in CA who work for the private sector have, to date. lost 4.2 million jobs. The government jobs that will be lost if these props fails are said to be .2 million (yes, thats a decimal point in front of that 2). So that tells you the problem in a nut shell. Way too many people employed by the government, way too much government and way too much union government jobs. Until the rate of job loss in the government is equal to that in the private sector, we are in trouble. Problem is, us in the private sector, appear to be outnumbered.

Wake up Pleasanton. Wake up CA. Wake up US.

NO MORE TAXES NO MORE GOVERNMENT GROWTH AND PLEASE SEE THE UNIONS FOR WHAT THEY ARE.

Posted by Einstein, a member of the Mohr Elementary School community, on May 19, 2009 at 9:13 pm
Einstein is a member (registered user) of PleasantonWeekly.com

I do not believe it is over but unless we have leadership that is willing act boldly it will be over. WSJ had a great piece and basically they suggested that we immediately move the opposite way of the direction we went in February and that is to reduce taxes by moving sales tax to a more reasonable 6 to 7 percent and going to a flat tax because in California with a population of over 36,000,000 17,000,000 pay no taxes or less than 1 percent of their income. We need to vote out every elected official in the state who is or has been in favor of higher taxes. Bankrupcy would be the best solution for salvation as it would break up all of these 3 point government retirement programs and people would actually be at risk like the rest of us.