Voters Are Asked to ‘Just Say No’

Local initiatives and other changes to the County Charter that cost county government money would have to pay for themselves under a measure placed on the Nov. 3 ballot Wednesday by the Board of Supervisors.

The “Just Say No” amendment is specifically aimed at gutting an initiative sponsored by the county Deputy Sheriffs Assn. that would require minimum staffing levels in county jails and on the streets of the unincorporated area, without saying how the county will pay for the added coverage.

That initiative, petitioned onto the ballot via the signature-gathering process, will also appear before voters Nov. 3.

The so-called Just Say No amendment also would apply to any other local Charter amendment that tries to impose a new “mandatory service, duty or cost” on the fiscally strapped county without “a new, specific and legally available source of revenue to fully fund all costs.”

However, the measure exempts any new demands approved by two-thirds of the voters from that restriction. Only measures approved by a simple majority would be covered.