Contact: Bruce Mirken, Greenlining Institute Media Relations Coordinator,  415-846-7758 (cell)

LOS ANGELES – Representatives of The Greenlining Institute, California Common Cause and the Center for Governmental Studies will be in Los Angeles today to brief advocates, policymakers and the media on new survey findings showing voters want better information on state ballot initiatives, including clearer disclosure of campaign funders. The results are a potential warning for legislators who defeated a measure to increase such disclosure earlier this week.

Concerned by the growing influence of special interest money and use of the initiative system to attack civil rights, Greenlining last year assembled a diverse, 33-person advisory board, commissioned a two-wave public opinion survey of a representative sample of California eligible voters and mounted a statewide listening tour that visited 14 California cities.

The full survey results are now available online here. Today’s briefing will cover these findings, feedback from the listening tour and ongoing efforts to return the initiative process to the ideal of “citizen democracy.” The briefing is co-hosted by Hispanas Organized for Political Equality.

WHAT: Policy briefing, A Community Perspective on Ballot Initiative Reform.

WHO: Kathay Feng, California Common Cause; Bob Stern, Center for Governmental Studies; Orson Aguilar and Michelle Romero, The Greenlining Institute.

WHEN: Friday, Feb. 3, 1:30-3 p.m.

WHERE: Mexican American Legal Defense & Education Fund, Edison Room, 634 S. Spring St., downtown Los Angeles

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THE GREENLINING INSTITUTE
A Multi-Ethnic Public Policy, Research and Advocacy Institute
www.greenlining.org