Capitol Alert: Jerry Brown commits typo, forced to re-file tax initiative

Capitol Alert

The latest on California politics and government

January 16, 2012

Jerry Brown commits typo, forced to re-file tax initiative

Gov. Jerry Brown is taking a mulligan, tripped up by a typographical error and forced to re-file his ballot initiative to raise taxes.

The Democratic governor on Friday filed paperwork with the state for "The Schools and Local Public Safety Protection Act of 2012- ver. 2." The measure is identical to one Brown filed in December, the governor said in a filing with the attorney general's office, "except that we have corrected a typographical error that resulted in two numbers being transposed."

Re-filing an initiative can delay the attorney general's preparation of its title and summary, potentially condensing the period for a proponent to gather signatures and making that effort more expensive.

But Brown adviser Steve Glazer said this afternoon that he does not expect the mistake to affect Brown's timing ahead of the November election.

"We don't think it will affect our schedule," Glazer said. "It was a typo."

Jon Coupal, president of the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association, opposes Brown's tax measure, but he was sympathetic about Brown's mistake.

"It's when you find that mistake after spending $1 million on signatures that that's a real problem," he said. "This is really part of the whole initiative game."

Coupal said he expects the re-filing to "affect the timing a little bit." But for the initiative to be on the street by the end of the month, as Glazer expects, "sounds about right," Coupal said.

Brown's measure, to temporarily increase the state sales tax and income taxes on California's highest earners, is expected to be a major focus for the governor this year, in the second year of his third term.

To see the correction, read Brown's letter on the jump

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