The CAUSE mission is to build grassroots power to realize social, economic and environmental justice for the people of the Ventura and Santa Barbara counties region through policy research, leadership development, organizing, and advocacy.

Based on CAUSE’s mission, priority focus areas, and values of dignity, justice and equity, and stewardship, the CAUSE Board of Directors reviewed all state ballot propositions and approved the following recommendations:

Proposition 1        YES
Safe, Reliable High-Speed Passenger Train Bond Act for the 21st Century
Allows state to sell $9.95 billion bonds to create a high-speed train between San Francisco and LA, to be completed in 2030. High-speed rail will reduce air pollution by keeping hundreds of cars of the road every day.

Proposition 4        NO
Parental notification for pregnancy termination
California voters rejected similar proposals in 2005 and 2006. Parental notification puts the teens in abusive homes at greater risk.

Proposition 6        NO
Runner Initiative
Would require young teens be sent to adult prisons for any gang-related conviction, impose harsher criminal penalties and subject recipients of public housing assistance to criminal background checks. Diverts up to $1 Billion in state funding from public education and health services to instead incarcerate more youth. Changes evidence rules to allow use of certain hearsay statements as evidence.

Proposition 7        YES
Renewable Energy
Requires government-owned utilities, to generate 20% of their power from renewable energy by 2010. Raises requirement for all utilities to 40% by 2020 and 50% by 2025. Imposes penalties for noncompliance.

Proposition 8        NO
Same Sex Marriage Ban. Constitutional Amendment
Would change the California Constitution to define marriage as exclusively between a man and a woman.

Proposition 10        NO
Alternative Fuel Vehicles & Renewable Energy
$5 billion dollar bond paid by taxpayers to provide monetary benefits to a few corporations and individuals. This measure over-emphasizes natural gas instead of renewable energy.

CAUSE 2008 State Ballot Proposition Recommendations
October 13, 2008
 download pdf
 

The Halaco Superfund Site is located near a community with a high concentration of low wage working families, children and youth and people of color. Read more about Environmental Justice in our inaugural The CAUSE Policy Brief: Halaco Superfund Site and Environmental Justice.

Read about CAUSE’s growing environmental justice movement in the Ventura County Star http://www.venturacountystar.com/news/2008/oct/13/rally-focuses-on-immigration-environment/
 

World-renowned environmental advocate, Dr. Jane Goodall was invited by CAUSE to speak to local high school youth and to visit the Halaco Superfund Site as part of CAUSE’s efforts to advance environmental justice in the Central Coast. True to her message, Dr. Goodall took the time to visit the South Oxnard Halaco superfund site and offered her support to the leaders of South Oxnard in their campaign to clean up the site.

CAUSE was recently funded by The California Endowment to partner with the USC Program on Environmental and Regional and Equity to study the environmental justice concerns of the Halaco superfund site.  For more information on the community driven effort to clean-up Halaco, contact Araceli Centeno at 805-487-8984 or araceli@coastalalliance.com.
 

Perla Batalla
and SPECIAL GUESTS

The Gospel Choir of the
Evangelistic Missionary
Baptist Church

Ventura Center for Spiritual Living
(formerly Church of Religious Science)
101 S. Laurel St., Ventura, CA 93001
Saturday, May 10, 2008, 7 p.m.
Benefits Central Coast Alliance United for a Sustainable Economy
$25 General Admission

Tickets & Information (805)-658-0810 or purchase tickets online at http://www.coastalalliance.com/ticket/cause-mother-s-day-weekend-concert-ticket.html  

CAUSE invites you to promote your business/organization, or honor mom with an ad or very special greeting in the CAUSE Mothers Day Weekend Concert program .

Get a taste of our headlining perfomer Perla Batalla's wonderful music at www.perla.com!

CAUSE congratulations all the community, labor and faith-based leaders for their work to successfully have a super store ballot measure placed on the November 2009 ballot. 

It is time for the residents of Ventura and our allies around the county to stand up and let our voices be heard.

Since November 2004 CAUSE, in conjunction with the Stop Ventura Wal-Mart Coalition, the Tri-Counties Labor Foundation and Livable Ventura, led a successful local campaign to stop the development of a proposed Wal-Mart on Victoria Avenue in Ventura. The effort has included grassroots organizing, community education and policy initiatives including the adoption of a one-year 2006 moratorium on the development, and in 2007 the adoption of an interim ordinance. In 2009 the campaign will focus on bringing about the passage of the City of Ventura Super Store Ballot Measure on the November 2009 ballot. 

For more information on the ballot measure, and upcoming actions, and how you can participate, log on to www.StopWalmartVentura.com. 

For information on regular meetings of the Stop Ventura Wal-Mart Coalition and on the work of Livable Ventura contact Nan Waltman at no2walmart@yahoo.com.
 

More information on the Stop Ventura Wal-Mart effort:

Opponents seek to get Wal-Mart on the ballot
Ventura County Star, October 25, 2007

No to Wal-Mart – Yes to a Livable Ventura
The CAUSE, December 2006

Ventura OKs Moratorium on Stores: Victoria Avenue Ban Includes Proposed Site for Wal-Mart
Ventura County Star, Jan 24, 2006 

How Your Tax Dollars Subsidize the World's Largest Corporation
VC Reporter, Greg LeRoy - Nov 10, 2005

Living wage sought in Ventura: Coalition urges ballot measure
Ventura County Star, May 24, 2005
 

CAUSE and the Santa-Barbara based Coalition for Sustainable Transportation (COAST) have formed the Alliance for Sustainable and Equitable Regional Transportation (ASERT), a collaborative effort to organize a regional Ventura and Santa Barbara Counties transit equity alliance of community, environmental, labor, business and faith-based organizations.

Current ASERT activities include the hosting of several community education events, including the first Central Coast regional community transit summit, and exploration into conducting grassroots community campaigns to adopt city and county sales tax ballot measures in the Counties of Ventura and Santa Barbara, emphasizing public transit. On Saturday, March 1, 2008, ASERT hosted its first educational event,  a forum entitled "The Future of the Central Coast Regional Transportation System: Let's Learn How to Make it Happen," with former Governor Michael Dukakis. The next forum took place on Saturday, May 10, 2008 with the City of Ventura City Manager, Rick Cole, at Ruby's Cafe in Oxnard. ASERT is now organizing a Central Coast Regional Transit Summit for January 2009 in the City of Ventura. The community transit summit, which is expected in be attended by over 500 residents and elected officials, will include several nationally known speakers and panels addressing the many aspects of creating an integrated regional transit system in the Central Coast.  

For more information on ASERT activities, including how to get involved, contact CAUSE Community Planning Director, Carmen Ramirez, at (805) 658-0810, or at carmen@coastalalliance.com.
 

To make health coverage a reality for all, sign-on in support of the Ventura County Quality Declaration on Universal Healthcare! The Ventura County Declaration on Quality Universal Healthcare brought together health care advocates and providers, faith, labor, community based and elected representatives towards a common goal. In 2007, the Declaration was used to evaluate the various health coverage proposals and determine which best realizes the goal of quality universal healthcare. In 2008, we are likely to see not one but several statewide health coverage initiatives and multiple proposals by presidential candidates. Let your voice be heard and support the Declaration on Quality Universal Healthcare.

For more information, contact CAUSE Associate Executive Director, Maricela Morales, at 805-658-0810 x 203 or maricela@coastalalliance.com.
 

Liliana Santuario, her breast-feeding infant, Pablito, and VC CLUE members continue their struggle for a just, humane immigration reform policy that upholds family unity from the prophetic sanctuary at the United Church of Christ in Simi Valley (UCCSV). 

Despite some protests, Liliana, VC CLUE, the UCCSV and allied congregations grow in number, strength and resolve to show the human face of immigrant workers and their families, their contributions to the society and the need to stop the raids that separate families. 

Over seventy-five interfaith leaders from around the country participated in the National New Sanctuary Movement Convening in Simi Valley this month.  There Liliana’s inspirational words reminded everyone to “look at these hands, they are the hands of 12 million people who are here to help our families and the nation.”