Fresno County supervisors have filed a lawsuit against California after Gov. Gavin Newsom signed legislation forcing a local road tax onto the November ballot.
Newsom, 56, signed Assembly Bill 1923 last week, requiring Fresno County to place the Better Roads, Safe Streets initiative before voters on Nov. 3. The measure would add a half-cent sales tax to fund roads and other transportation projects. Assemblymember Esmeralda Soria, D-Merced, authored the bill, which passed the State Senate 27-8 and the Assembly 54-16 before reaching the governor’s desk.
County supervisors had previously ordered a 30-day review of the citizen-initiated measure, a step critics said was designed to delay it past the November election. Supporters of the tax then turned to Sacramento to force the issue onto the ballot. The board responded with a 3-2 vote to sue the state, with Board Chairman Garry Bredefeld leading the charge against what he called unprecedented state interference.
“This is about whether Fresno County governs itself or whether political power and Sacramento connections can be used to overrule us whenever local voters and their representatives refuse to fall in line,” Bredefeld said.
The county’s lawsuit describes AB 1923 as “a statute unlike any other in the modern history of California election law.” Supervisor Nathan Magsig said 30 that county officials met with attorneys and concluded the Newsom-signed measure is “flawed,” “ambiguous” and raises “significant constitutional issues.”
The lawsuit also names the county’s own election clerk, James Kus, who said he intends to follow the state law despite supervisors voting to postpone the election on the initiative until March 2028. Kus admitted to ABC 30 that the pending lawsuit could change things.
“Now a court could further refine what the assembly bill means,” he said.
Supporters of the initiative blasted the county’s lawsuit. Sandra Celedon, a member of the Better Roads Safe Streets initiative, fired back at the supervisors directly.
“Democracy cannot be overridden just because three people want that to happen,” Celedon said. “They can say that the sky is purple, but guess what, it’s still not, so we are going to be on the ballot in November.”
In the viral moment that sparked the legislative battle, Fresno County supervisors in late July ordered a 30-day review of the Better Roads, Safe Streets initiative after supporters submitted more than 32,000 signatures to qualify it for the ballot. The board’s 3-2 vote to delay came after critics accused supervisors of using procedural tactics to kill the measure by pushing it past November’s election deadline. Supporters, who say the tax would not raise rates but renew existing funding, appealed to state lawmakers for intervention. Soria introduced AB 1923 with an urgency clause allowing immediate effect upon Newsom’s signature, bypassing the county’s delay tactic entirely.
A court decision is expected before Sept. 9, the deadline for when ballots must be printed and begin being shipped.