The Bay Area Council's ambitious effort to convene a California constitutional convention and restructure the state's governmental apparatus has stumbled.
The council abandoned the effort to place two measures on this year's ballot due to financial problems and disagreement over their thrust. Now some think-tank mavens and political junkies are promoting a new "virtual constitutional convention."
It's called reThinkCali.com, and it says it will "use Twitter and other social media to re-write the state's constitution, and educate and engage everyone in innovating new solutions to California's chronic problems."
The project will offer prizes, scholarships and "stardom" to reward participants' contributions.
"California's governance crisis is at the very root of our state's economic and fiscal problems, said Lenny Mendonça, chair of the reThinkCali advisory board and of the Bay Area Economic Institute and a one-time chair of the Bay Area Council. "The solution for those problems will come from innovation and new ideas, and reThinkCali is a fun catalyst."
"Policy entrepreneur" Anthony Rubenstein of Los Angeles is the project's originator. He's a veteran of California's ballot measure wars, primarily as an opponent of oil companies.
"We're going to unleash the spirit of invention and out-of-the-box thinking that has made California the global engine of economic and cultural innovation," Rubenstein said. "By using California's new media tools like Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube to throw open the gates, we want to encourage everyone with an idea to fix what ails us to get involved, get heard and get rewarded."
The path to participation lies here.
IMAGE: The pen used by Pablo De la Guerra to sign the California constitution at the 1849 California Constitutional Convention. California State Library Collection. Photo credit: M. Anthony Martinez.
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