Bay Area-wide Measure Could Have Future Impact, Professor McDaniel Says

SAN FRANCISCO MAGAZINE -- This Bay Area–wide measure is a first: It’s on all nine county ballots and, if passed, would score a meaningful victory for regional cooperation. Measure AA would impose a $12-per-year parcel tax for 20 years in the nine Bay Area counties to pay for restoration of marshes and wetlands along the bay. That means $25 million per year can go to shoring up the coast against sea-level rise. “People are watching this, because if it passes and it works, people will see it as a way to get regional cooperation on other issues, like transit and housing,” San Francisco State Political Science Professor Jason McDaniel says. To pass, the measure needs a two-thirds majority of all Bay Area voters. But it doesn’t need a supermajority in each county — only an overall majority in all counties together. “That’s a big deal,” McDaniel says. “This is one of those things where when we look back on it, it could be historic.”