Davis OKs Campaign Spending Limits Measure for Ballot

Gov. Gray Davis late Friday signed legislation that will give voters a chance to impose limits on campaign donations, and overturn a far more strict set of limits approved by voters in 1996.

Acting with uncommon speed, the Legislature, prodded by Senate President Pro Tem John Burton (D-San Francisco) and Assembly Speaker Bob Hertzberg (D-Sherman Oaks), approved the measure last week without public testimony.

If voters approve the measure in November, the restrictions would take effect in 2002 for legislative candidates. But they won’t kick in for gubernatorial candidates until after Davis runs for reelection in 2002.

Still, Davis said he was signing the bill “with considerable reservations.”

“This bill was devised largely in secret, without input from the public or knowledgeable sources,” Davis said in a statement, noting that he was not informed of the measure until two days before lawmakers approved it.

The measure seeks to cap donations from an individual to state Senate and Assembly candidates at $3,000 for the primary, and another $3,000 for the general election. Candidates for statewide office could take up to $5,000 in donations from individuals per election, and the governor could collect $20,000 in donations from individual donors.

The measure, SB 1223, also would provide incentives for candidates to agree to voluntary spending.

Davis criticized the voluntary limits of $16 million for gubernatorial races, even though they won’t affect him. No winning candidate for governor has spent $16 million since Pete Wilson was elected in 1990, having spent $16.02 million.

“It is utopian to believe that candidates in 2006, faced with ever-rising media costs, will be in compliance with the voluntary spending limits in this measure,” Davis said in the statement.

If voters approve the measure, it would repeal Proposition 208, the 1996 voter-approved initiative that caps donations at $500 per election in legislative races and $1,000 in statewide races.

U.S. District Judge Lawrence Karlton struck down Proposition 208, concluding the caps were too strict. However, proponents of Proposition 208 appealed, and won the right to a new trial scheduled to begin Tuesday. They charge that lawmakers pushed for the new ballot measure believing that courts will affirm Proposition 208.

Former acting Secretary of State Tony Miller, a leading proponent of Proposition 208 along with California Common Cause, the League of Women Voters and others, vows to campaign against Burton’s measure.

“We have a lot at stake,” Miller said. “We put too much time and energy and money into 208 to see it go down. We will do everything we can to save 208.”