Next time you hear, “The sky is falling!” consider that maybe it actually is.
That’s one of the lessons from the trials and tribulations of Stockton, California, according to Dino Cortopassi, a Stockton native and savvy farmer who is sponsoring Proposition 53, which would require voter approval for revenue bonds over $2 billion. Cortopassi watched as his beloved town slipped into insolvency several years ago and he’s determined to see California avoid the same fate.
The fiery businessman was recently interviewed about the measure.
“I was in debt a long part of my life,” says Cortopassi. “Debt never goes away. So when you borrow, don’t forget you have to pay it back.”
California is no different, Cortopassi warns. He says the state’s obligations are already affecting public services. He points to our unfunded pension liability, more than $60 billion in deferred maintenance on public roads, and the impacts of realignment, just to name a few.
The No on 53 campaign and Gov. Jerry Brown in particular have scoffed at these ideas—and the man behind them. Furthermore, they say his measure would hurt struggling cities like Stockton the most.
"Big infrastructure projects help cities. We've got to have investments in our roads, our dams, our bridges -- we've got to have our water system in place and Prop 53 will endanger those very things," the governor said in San Francisco Friday during a last-minute push against the ballot measure, accompanied by Mayor Ed Lee and others.
"One millionaire [Cortopassi] put almost $5 million of his own money to put it on the ballot to change the constitution in California and to make it more difficult to do what we have to do, whether its building water projects, recycling, electrifying a rail, building the kind of hospitals and expansion of the university of California, all the projects that are so vital to our prosperity," said Brown, calling the measure “dysfunctionality on steroids.”
The No on 53 campaign has raised some legitimate questions about Cortopassi’s motives and math. But the businessman still makes a persuasive case about the crushing weight of debt, as taught by Stockton.
Read more about the lessons from Stockton’s bankruptcy here.