Others say if the legislature could do something sufficient to prevent another initiative from getting to the ballot in 2002, that might free up more business-community money to help Republicans get elected instead of fighting amendments. Owens, though, expects a ballot issue no matter what the legislature does. Democrats criticize Owens for not being very clear on his growth agenda. He was quick to oppose their ideas but slow to propose his own, they said. We'll be lucky if we get much of anything done.
Politicians face a tough job, trying to represent a public that is of multiple minds on the issue.
But mandatory comprehensive planning, annexation controls and interjurisdictional disputes are growth issues that still need to be decided. By his count, Owens had an 80 percent success rate on education initiatives. Two disappointments, he said, were that he didn't get tax credits for contributions to education or a requirement that public schools install filtering software to prevent elementary school students from accessing violent and pornographic Web sites. Early on, there was concern that money required to meet Amendment 23 obligations would mean less money for the transportation projects voters had approved a year earlier. That meant money for higher education as well as prisons, another key Owens agenda item.