A dozen statewide proposals have qualified for the November vote. That's a lot, although one or more could withdraw from consideration in the coming months. (And the Times editorial board will be there to help voters negotiate the long vote with detailed recommendations.)
Fortunately, voters will not face a discriminatory proposal that would have required teachers and school administrators to inform parents about their children's gender identity at school and enact anti-trans sports and bathroom policies for students. Proponents of the ironically named Protect Kids California campaign, which would also have restricted health care for transgender youth, announced this week that they failed to gather more than half a million signatures needed to qualify for the November election.
It's a relief because while California voters often make the right decision when faced with really bad ballot measures, sometimes they get it wrong. Remember Proposition 8 of 2008, which banned same-sex marriage? (The measure was repealed and voters will be asked to reaffirm same-sex marriage protections in November.)
Still, it's discouraging that the group was able to collect more than 400,000 signatures, mostly from Southern California counties. We don't know if all the signatures are valid; But if at least half are, that's a lot of Californians who don't fully understand what the measure would do, agree with it, or don't care.
They should care, because the proposal is bigoted, petty, and completely unnecessary. There is no evidence of a wave of students being assaulted or harassed by transgender classmates. The only trend is that Republican-governed cities and states have adopted these anti-transgender policies, mislabeling them as “parental rights.”
The initiative would have required schools to inform parents if their child began using pronouns for a gender not assigned at birth, even if doing so could put the child at risk of abuse. It would also have taken away parental rights by prohibiting gender-affirming care, including puberty blockers, for minors, even if parents fully agree and doctors have recommended it as medically necessary.
Additionally, the proposal required students to use school bathrooms according to the gender assigned at birth, and would have prohibited trans girls from playing on women's sports teams in high school and college.
Although the particular initiative will not appear on the 2024 ballot, the issues behind it are still at play in the state. Some school boards have passed parental notification laws, and the California Legislature is considering a bill that would stop this trend by prohibiting school boards from adopting notification laws and protecting teachers from retaliation.
And despite the recent setback, Jonathan Zachreson, a Roseville, California, school board member and the measure's main proponent, says his group will try to qualify the measure in a future vote. It's a shame that of all the problems California is facing right now, they have chosen to focus their energy on attacking transgender teens.
