A booming economy has prompted a flood of new state revenue, giving lawmakers plenty of discretionary funds to direct toward California's public schools. Because the state's Proposition 98 guarantees public schools at least 40 percent of the annual state budget, the result has been record spending on education. The only indication so far has been Proposition 26, the failure of which would indicate that education is not as strong an issue at the polls as it is in public surveys. A proposition on the November ballot will reveal whether education is as strong an issue at the polls as it is in public opinion surveys. In the first general election of the twenty-first century, California voters may see public schools on the mend, but the CTA has failed to live up to its Prop. 98 promise of results and accountability.
Schools still fare poorly in terms of academic achievement.
Moreover, the CTA has gone from an organization interested in better schools to a union with a rigid agenda. While the CTA supports better schools via measures such as Proposition 26, two years previously it fought tooth and nail against Governor Wilson's Proposition 8, which among other things called for greater accountability through the creation of an office to monitor school performance. Odds are that the power and deep pockets of the proponents will win this time around. But they may not find it easy to convince Californians to surrender their fiscally conservative instincts. Deregulating American Politics, Selected Writings on Campaign Finance Reform, edited by Annelise Anderson.