Easy Voter's Guide: May 19 Election 2009

EASY VOTER’S GUIDE
California Special Election: May 19, 2009

For new readers and busy voters.

The 2009-10 budget adopted in February depends on $5.8 billion from Propositions 1C, 1D and 1E. If voters reject those propositions, the Legislature and Governor will have to come up with more spending cuts and tax increases or find another way to balance the budget.

The 6 statewide propositions on the ballot come from a recent agreement on how to deal with spending commitments that were $41.7 billion higher than projected state revenue. Some voters may also have local measures or offices on their ballot.

Read about the Propositions or Watch videos @

Proposition 1A State Budget
Proposition 1B Public Education Funding
Proposition 1C California State Lottery
Proposition 1D Transfer of Child Development Funds
Proposition 1E Transfer of Mental Health Funds
Proposition 1F Pay Raises for State Officials

The Easy Voter's Guide was started when a group of public library adult literacy students [ Bay Area New Readers Council ] felt that there was a lack of nonpartisan voter information accessible to adults still working on their reading skills.

Some of their innovations, job descriptions for each political office, have been adopted by the Secretary of State's official Voter Information Guide.

The nonpartisan “Easy Voter Guide” (formerly Easy Reading Voter Guide) has been published for every California statewide election since 1994. It is a service of:

~ League of Women Voters of California Education Fund
~ California State Library
~ California Secretary of State's Office
~ The James Irvine Foundation provides additional support