"Water For Fighting," California Ballot Initiative Before Legislative Counsel of California

http://www.waterforfighting.org/ ^ | February 18, 2010 | California Watershed Posse

[WaterForFightingCAInitiative]

Date: February 18, 2010

To: Diane F. Boyer-Vine, Legislative Counsel of California

From: Oscar Alejandro Braun, Co-founder of the California Watershed Posse

Subject: Submission of text of proposed law (Government Code Section 10243)

Total Electors Signatures Pages Attached: 6

We, the People of the Republic of California, hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed; That whenever any form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Therefore, We the People have taken the first step in writing the text of a ballot initiative law that seeks to unshackle the longsuffering People of California from the bleak decades of thoroughly entangling legislation, the profuse restraining directives by unelected bureaucrats, and the restrictive court decisions by disconnected jurists that have deprived Californians from their rightful and unalienable pursuits.

In the 1970s, the People of California were prohibitively taxed in such a manner that they became a People unwelcome even in their own homes and the State at large. Relief through normal legislative means looked decades away, while families, retirees, and businesses fled the State. The People then exerted their power and passed Proposition 13, an end-around initiative that displaced the ineffective efforts of a stalled legislature, a conflicted executive leadership, and finally brought the People of California into a long period of prosperity.

Alas, the People of California now suffer a greater affliction wherein the State has made herself prone to obligations her citizens cannot possibly meet, let alone sustain. The current generation of inept legislators and tired executive branch members once again promote suspicious relief decades hence, even as her farms are blighted and a mass emigration of California’s youth, entrepreneurs and brain trust ensues. The People of California once more demand a bypath around her moribund public representatives and jurists. Insomuch, the Water For Fighting Initiative is a lance for this Gordion Knot of many problems vexing California, an initiative meant to reset the balance of California's natural resources with her economy and to the truest measure of her needs.

Proposed Text for "Water For Fighting" Ballot Initiative

“The State of California shall make no law prohibiting the free exercise of the People’s exclusive unalienable Right to Life; or abridging the freedom of the People’s exclusive unalienable Right to Life, Use and Consumption of air, CO2 , water, residential property and energy generating natural resources. The State of California shall not levy any taxes, fees, assessments or fines on the Use or Consumption by the People of air, CO2, water, residential property and energy generating natural resources. Effective December 1st 2010, passage of this ballot initiative by the voters will repeal the 1970 California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA), California Coastal Act of 1976, California Endangered Species Act (CESA) and the US California Global Warming Act (AB32), and Exempt the People of California from ALL Federal powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the State of California respectively, or to the People.”

[WaterForFightingCAInitiative]

The California Watershed Posse, a California Coordinated Resource Management and Planning Council, announces its breakout of their "Water For Fighting," a Proposed California Ballot Initiative meant to reset the economy of California much as Proposition 13 did in the 1970s.

Please visit www.waterforfighting.org or www.cwposse.org and click on the Water For Fighting tab to examine links and sign the virtual petition.

[Monorprise]

Nice bill

[Carry_Okie]

Wet dream.

[aquila48]

I like it and it would be an earthquake for california politics, but has it received any legal opinion as to whether it would withstand court challenges?

[marsh2]

The “People” of the state of California only have a right to use water that is surplus to that appropriated prior to 1914. Water use rights prior to 1914 are privately owned property and cannot be taken without just compensation. Appropriative water use after 1914 is “permitted” by the state and is revocable. Public trust rights apply to these “permitted” rights. Riparian rights are attached to the land, but can be dormant and of a lower relative priority if not developed.

The right to develop minerals and to use and dispose of most natural resources is an incident of private property ownership by individuals. The “people” do not have a “right” to use them - just the owners, unless it is taken for a legitimate public purpose and just compensation is paid. Privately ownership includes the use, enjoyment and disposal of property. Traditionally, regulation is supposed to only be to protect the general public health, safety and morals from substantial injury.

People have to be careful how they word their initiative. This one has problems. Also, it is the initiative process itself that has helped create the budget crisis by committing the state to water and other bonds.