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DB12:018
January 24, 2012

Contact: Shannan Velayas
(916) 653-6575

High Speed Rail Initiative Enters Circulation

Elimination of California High Speed Rail
Authority. Initiative Constitutional Amendment.

SACRAMENTO - Secretary of State Debra Bowen today announced that the proponent of a new initiative may begin collecting petition signatures for his measure.

The Attorney General prepares the legal title and summary that is required to appear on initiative petitions. When the official language is complete, the Attorney General forwards it to the proponent and to the Secretary of State. The Secretary of State then provides calendar deadlines to the proponent and to county elections officials, and the initiative may be circulated for signatures. The Attorney General’s official title and summary for the measure is as follows:

ELIMINATION OF CALIFORNIA HIGH SPEED RAIL AUTHORITY. INITIATIVE CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENT. Eliminates High Speed Rail Authority. Bars the State of California from paying for high speed rail unless the people pass a new constitutional amendment specifically altering this prohibition. Summary of estimate by Legislative Analyst and Director of Finance of fiscal impact on state and local government: State debt service savings of up to $650 million annually from not using state bond funds to support highspeed rail. A one-time loss of $3.3 billion in federal funds would reduce somewhat the level of economic activity in the state over the next several years, resulting in some reduction in state and local revenues.(11-0084.)

The Secretary of State's tracking number for this measure is 1558 and the Attorney General's tracking number is 11-0084.

The proponent for this measure, Peter Seidel, must collect signatures of 807,615 registered voters – the number equal to eight percent of the total votes cast for governor in the 2010 gubernatorial election – in order to qualify it for the ballot. The proponent has 150 days to circulate petitions for this measure, meaning the signatures must be collected by June 21, 2012.

The initiative proponent can be reached at P.O. Box 5738, Beverly Hills, California 90209. No phone number was provided.

To sign up for regular ballot measure updates via email, RSS feed, or Twitter, go to www.sos.ca.gov/multimedia.

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