In early 2011, Munger was inspired to find new money for the public schools after hearing Dennis Cima, senior vice president of the Silicon Valley Leadership Group, raise the idea of a broad-based, sliding-scale income-tax hike paid by all but the poorest.
"We just thought, Let's learn by doing," Munger says. "Let's write an initiative and just do it, and that way it will exist and something will exist. ... We're an advocacy group, so it's the kind of thing you do."
PHOTO BY NANETTE GONZALES
Jerry Brown's $6 billion to $8.5 billion tax measure has been hurt by his team's amateurish and self-inflicted mistakes.
PHOTO BY NANETTE GONZALES
Molly Munger and Steve English, at home in Pasadena: "We have a particular responsibility to give back," he says.
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Yes on 30's Newman has hinted that Munger is driven by questionable motives. Some critics have accused her of secretly working with her wealthy, conservative half-brother, Charles Munger Jr., a Stanford University physicist, to bring down Brown's tax measure. (Charles has given $20 million to a committee working to both defeat Gov. Brown's Proposition 30 and win approval of Proposition 32, a measure to prevent unions from taking automatic payroll deductions from union members to finance political campaigns.) Others accuse Munger of undertaking a vanity project.
To theories like these, Rice declares, "That's the stupidest thing I've ever heard! They know nothing about Molly. This is not about her. She gains nothing from this. In fact, she only loses money. She knows kids need this."
Franklin D. Gilliam Jr., dean of UCLA's School of Public Affairs, says it's not surprising that Munger's and English's $32 million investment fed a backlash.
"People look a lot at money and where the money is coming from," Gilliam says. "And if they believe [a ballot measure] is being driven by one person, like Munger, they get nervous. It becomes an idea that it's a vanity project, and it doesn't matter whether that's true or not. It's the perception that matters."
Newman goes much further, calling Munger's millions a threat to democracy. "To have wealthy people tip the scales so drastically is a tragedy," he says. "It takes spectacular hubris for these two Mungers to think they know more about our schools than teachers and principals."
Another multimillionaire who spent part of his fortune trying to fix the schools via the ballot box — former L.A. Mayor Richard Riordan — has known the Munger family for three decades, and he says these critics don't understand either Munger sibling. The rich brother and sister who in middle age have rocketed into the public consciousness "have not become interested in 'politics,' but in making things happen," Riordan says.
Last spring, Riordan was preparing to write an op-ed against Gov. Brown's tax plan. As a courtesy, he called Anne Gust Brown to let the couple know. The governor was concerned enough to meet Riordan at his palatial Brentwood home, but he couldn't win him over. Riordan decided to back Munger's tax measure. "If you're interested in getting more money into the schools," he argues, "Molly's is infinitely better."
While Munger and English are true believers in their cause, Jerry Brown is trying to sell a measure that he probably does not love.
Brown wrote Proposition 30 with two major special-interest groups — the California Federation of Teachers and the Courage Campaign — along with Democratic leaders, including state Senate President Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg, after the two powerful campaign-fundraiser groups refused to support Brown's own tax plan and threatened to take theirs to voters.
Under Proposition 30, Brown has promised that $5.4 billion in pending cuts to public schools — which he and the state Legislature have approved but not yet enacted — would be averted. However, billions also would flow to the General Fund controlled by the Legislature — and there's no guarantee any of that new money would end up in classrooms.
Brown's measure would hike the state sales tax for four years by one-quarter of a cent, making California's the nation's highest and bringing in $1 billion or so annually. The plan also would boost income taxes for seven years for the roughly 150,000 people among California's 37.7 million residents who earn more than $250,000 annually. The narrowly focused income tax would produce a highly unpredictable pot of annual money estimated at perhaps $5 billion — but that's give or take a billion, or more.
A whiff of panic has set in among high-powered proponents of Proposition 30 such as teachers unions and county governments, who are relying on the tax hike's passage. In October, the governor finally began appearing at rallies at UCLA and other public universities to warn students that, if the measure fails, young people will suffer further tuition hikes.
Then, in mid-October, after Munger announced on NBC4 Los Angeles that she was about to air a TV commercial that would "compare and contrast" Proposition 38 with Proposition 30, Democratic heavyweights, including the president of the State Board of Education, the California Teachers Association and Steinberg, sent Munger a highly unusual warning letter, telling her to "rethink this destructive course of action."
Republican consultant Jonathan Wilcox, who was involved in the campaign to recall Gov. Gray Davis, found the warning letter sent to Munger "incoherent and panicked. ... They keep hitting the mute button, but Molly Munger is still talking."
Jon Coupal, president of the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association, which has spent $440,000 attacking Brown's tax proposal, says, "It does not surprise us that the simmering war between the two camps broke into the open. Did Jerry or Anne ever think that Molly would back down? I don't think so. The snippy communication from Darrell Steinberg was incredible. And Molly's response was, 'Thank you for providing us with strategy [suggestions] but we'll go our own road.' That is a big 'fuck you' to Jerry Brown."
