| 63 percent voters call for immediate troop withdrawal Original Source Link: (May no longer be active) http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/news/special_packages/election2004/10084074.htmIn San Francisco, 63 percent of the voters supported a resolution rebuking President Bush's foreign policy and urging an immediate withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq.
http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/news/special_packages/election2004/10084074.htm
Posted on Wed, Nov. 03, 2004 Norcal voters ban biotech crops, approve of marijuana and condemn Bush
LISA LEFF Associated Press
SAN FRANCISCO - Going easy on prostitution didn't go over well in Berkeley, but easing up on marijuana smokers was just fine in Oakland. Condemning the war in Iraq was an obvious choice for many San Franciscans, but they were less certain about allowing non-citizens to elect school board members.
And while Marin County's wine and cheese lovers banned genetically modified crops, voters in three other counties decided differently.
Berkeley's measure Q, which would have ordered police to go easy on prostitutes, lost with just 36 percent support in the city known for its live-and-let-live values after city leaders worried publicly that it would cause them to proliferate on the city's streets.
A separate effort to set police priorities passed in Oakland with 64 percent support. Measure Z orders police to make marijuana possession its lowest enforcement priority and requires the city to develop a plan for licensing and taxing the sale, use and cultivation of pot for private use.
The third try for more money to fight crime also charmed Oakland voters, who passed a tax hike raising $20 million for more police officers and anti-violence programs. Measure Y needed a two-thirds majority to win and got 70 percent support. Two earlier public safety taxes had failed in recent years.
In San Francisco, 63 percent of the voters supported a resolution rebuking President Bush's foreign policy and urging an immediate withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq. But San Franciscans voted 51-49 to defeat a measure that would have given non-citizens the right to vote in school board elections.
Months after Mendocino County voters passed the nation's first ban of genetically modified crops, voters in Humboldt, San Luis Obispo and Butte counties rejected similar ballot measures Tuesday.
"Farmers can't be handcuffed with something that is available everywhere but here," said Tom Ikeda, president of the San Luis Obispo County Farm Bureau.
The Humboldt County loss was expected because supporters dropped their campaign after complaints that the ballot language contained inaccurate scientific descriptions and also called for the jailing of farmers growing genetically modified crops.
The measures were placed on their respective ballots after Mendocino voters approved the first such ban in March, despite the biotechnology industry spending more than $600,000 in a failed attempt to defeat it. This time, the industry was almost nonexistent, leaving fund-raising and organized opposition to local farmers.
|
|