Election Prep: WA Engrossed House Joint Resolution 4204

Ballot Text:

The legislature has proposed a constitutional amendment on school district tax levies.

This amendment would provide for approval of school district excess property tax levies by simple majority vote of participating voters, and would eliminate supermajority approval requirements based on voter turnout in previous elections.

Explanation and pro/con statements here. Full text here.

In general I like supermajority requirements. Not just on taxes, but on most things. If we required 90% for everything, I think we’d be better off. The current constitution requires 60% approval (and a certain level of turnout) for approval of certain ax measures. The pro statement points out that this can result in some taxes not being approved, and therefore less money to spend on things (in this case generally schools.) Duh. But if it is important enough, 60% is not that high a bar, and according to the con statement, that bar is generally met.

Also, independent of all that, I somewhat dislike that the WAY it is done in the actual text is not to change the original text to eliminate the supermajority requirement, but rather by tacking at the end a “Not withstanding what was said earlier, it will be like this.” There is probably some good reason to do it that way, but I don’t like it, it makes reading the text less straightforward and makes it harder to determine the overall meaning without reading very carefully. I don’t like that.

So, my vote is:

REJECTED