Arizona Green Party Position on the Propositions:

Arizona Green Party Position on the Propositions:

NO on Prop 100, “No New House Tax”

This would prevent the state, or any local government, from charging developers a fee on the sale of new houses. It is something that has not been done here, yet, but has proven to be an urgently needed revenue source in other states, as they look to the impact of growth on publicly financed infrastructure. Someone has to bear these costs, and fairness suggests that those who “upgrade” to newer and larger homes are, better able to pay, and cause more of the infrastructure demand, and should therefor shoulder a fee proportional to those added costs.

Additionally, there is the flawed underlying thinking about housing, based on real estate values, instead of real values. America needs homebuilders, but quick-shack commercial profiteers sow confusion by treating houses as though they were the same as homes, and making houses into mere investments. The oft-repeated notion that “your home is your best investment” sidetracks people from seeing the place they live in as a home, and making it livable according to their own needs and pleasant for their own lives, and turns that house into one more piece of commercialism. To treat one’s home as an investment means that we start thinking about other people’s homes, not as their places of refuge, pleasure and family, but as potential impacts on our investment, and so we start restricting their housing options, and fencing off their ability to build what brings them joy. When we think of our house as a mere investment, we want similar investments to sell high, even though it drives up our own annual property tax burden, and eventually makes our own home unaffordable to us. When it is all about investment, there is little regard for sucking a family into a contract that they cannot sustain, then foreclosing them into homelessness.

The Green Party wants to protect homes, and have a society where everyone can have a home. We want good regulation of the lending and building industries, so that people are not suckered and dumped. We want incentives to upgrade existing homes, as needed. But once the seller of a house treats that house like a commodity, or an investment to speculate on, why should it be taxed differently than other commodities or speculations? And why should it not be subject to reasonable fees, to pay for the infrastructure that surrounds it? And why should the industry that creates the commodity be protected from paying it’s fair share of the cost of making its product marketable?

As always, Greens suggest you look at who is funding this measure, and draw your own conclusions.

The Arizona Green Party OPPOSES Prop 100.

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Prop 101, “Medical Choice for AZ”

“The Arizona Green Party urges a NO vote.

The people who govern us have diddled around, scared by lobbyists and special interests, and have given us a two tiered healthcare system: a decent one for lawmakers, and for folks for whom money is no concern, and a highly inadequate healthcare system for the rest of us. In measure after measure of healthcare decency, we score, not first in the world, but sixteenth, or twenty-third, or eighth, or seventy-ninth. Long waits in other countries, for nonemergency care? Long waits here, if you’ve looked lately. And then the insurance, that you’ve paid into all your life, raises rates, raises co-pays, or doesn’t pay at all.

The solution has to be an American one, because this is who we are. But to find the solution, we have to get past the myths, and look at the reality. We need to understand why our healthcare system is the most expensive in the world, yet delivers so much less than it should. Did you know that a full third of the money spent on healthcare in this country goes to bureaucratic “management,” i.e., the insurance industry? Did you know that our much-touted pharmaceutical industry spends more on advertising than on research? There are some big mistakes being made here, and nobody is willing to look it over, and rein it in.

“Choice” is not simply about individuals choosing between lousy options– it is about voters choosing to create better options to choose from.

Meanwhile, the Arizona Green Party OPPOSES Prop 101.

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NO on 102

Prop 102 might be re-labeled as the “Protect Shaky Marriages” referendum. After all, most people take personal responsibility for the state of their own marriage, and do not blame any shakiness in it on whether somebody else is allowed to marry or not. Instead, they protect the state of their marriage by valuing each other, and by keeping their promises to each other. And the ultimate success of a marriage is nothing that a constitutional amendment can provide.

So, then why does government make laws, about marriage, at all? What defines real marriage is different from the kind of civil union sort of arrangement that government sets up divorce courts to enforce. Government can call that “marriage,” but, in reality, it isn’t, and never has been.

The Green Party of Arizona urges a NO vote on changing our state constitution to misdefine marriage.

We want to protect religious freedom. Either marriage is a sacred act, defined by people’s religious beliefs, or it is a secular, government-created legal contract. Which do you believe? Churches, temples and mosques have married people for thousands of years. They’ve done just fine, and will continue to do fine, without government defining marriage for them. Isn’t it up to each faith to decide who, among them, marries, and whose marriage to bless? We’ve no more business voting, on who can be married, than we do in voting about who can be baptized. And, if you don’t like how your church defines either, then go to another church, or no church at all. That’s religious freedom!

Legal rights, unlike religion, are the voters’ business. When two people ask government to protect their promises to each other, it’s a contract. Government should welcome such commitments, because it provides for stability and predictability. Government should be happy when people commit to take responsibility for each other, because it means fewer people needing state help. Government should welcome families forming, all kinds of families. Families are good. When we stop butting into religious concepts, like “marriage,” we can see that. Local governments have been working this out, and offering benefits to folks who commit to each other, esp when those folks are employees. And they’ve got it right. Leave them to it, in deciding which benefits to offer their workers. Don’t make a religious test, like marriage or baptism, enter into it. Call such contracts licenced unions, or whatever, and protect those contracts, without discrimination. Government should get out of the “marriage” business, altogether, and give the word “marriage” back to the faith communities.

We’re against government telling faith communities how to limit marriage. And we are against the faith communities telling government about whose domestic union contracts to recognize and enforce.

Protect freedom of religion. Protect Marriage. Vote NO.

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Prop 105, “Majority Rules– Let the People Decide”

“The Arizona Green Party urges a NO vote.

This pretends to be about “the people” deciding, but [surprise!] it isn’t.

For example, it creates a limitation on us voters, but only when we decide something is valuable enough to pay for. If this were such a good idea, why doesn’t it cut both ways? If the decision is truly ours, then any limitation in our constitution, should be even handed. After all, right now being able to run initiatives is the only way we voters have to bypass stalemates in the legislature, and get past the lobbyists’ wish-lists for our tax dollars. Why tie our hands?

But, get this, it isn’t about voters deciding, either. Because a majority of actual voters can’t decide anything, ever again, if we pass this measure. Only a majority of “registered” voters. So if, say, 49% of registered voters make it to the polls, then, even with 100% approval, what we want fails. That’s right– the phantom voter, who doesn’t cast a ballot, can cancel your vote. This measure disenfranchises people who actually vote, in favor of people who are registered, but do not vote.

The Green Party is about giving people more reasons to vote, not about presuming that folks who don’t show up are somehow voting against funding education, healthcare, protecting the environment, the air, the land. We actually believe that voters are smart, and want to save the planet, even if it means taxing themselves, or taxing some special interest that is trying to pull a fast one on them.

The Arizona Green Party OPPOSES Prop 105.

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The Arizona Green Party says NO on Prop 200, the “PayDay LoanShark Re-formation” Initiative.

This initiative, bought and paid for by the folks who charge over 400% annual interest, is not to be confused with the noble, but short-funded, effort to repeal PayDay LoanSharking. The LoanSharks are facing a Sunset provision that will automatically end their exploitation of the working poor, unless they can trick voters into resurrecting it. So this measure offers a minor tweak or two, to re-form and disguise the dirty truth, because they knew they couldn’t come to voters and just say “Feed me.”

This ballot measure is the one put on the ballot by the Pay Day Loan folks [known, and condemned, biblically as the "Usurers" and, under previous Arizona law, as "felons" and "Loan Sharks"]. They aren’t telling us this, but if it fails to pass, the PayDay Loan industry will be SunSetted out of existence in AZ [hurray!] Or, at least, have to lobby with the 2009 legislature, and accept some real reforms, in order to stay in business. As a constitutional amendment, it shuts off any legislation that might actually be supportable.

This stuff brings shame on decent local banks and credit unions, to even be lumped in the same Industry. LoanSharking used to be the stuff of mobsters, before the legislature agreed to be their big muscle enforcers. LoanSharking used to be a felony in Arizona, and, if Greens were elected to the legislature, it would be again.

The Arizona Green Party Opposes Prop 200.

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