Prop. 63: The Rich Pay a Little, the Homeless Get a Lot of Help

Garen Staglin is a Napa Valley winemaker and venture capitalist whose annual income exceeds $1 million. And he’s one rich man who’s eager to pay higher taxes.

Staglin is pushing for passage of Proposition 63, which would raise roughly $750 million a year to expand long-starved mental health programs -- and get thousands of homeless off the streets and into treatment.

The money would be raised by socking people like Staglin -- imposing an extra 1% levy on taxable personal income above $1 million.

There are only 25,000 to 30,000 million-plus earners in California. And one of the criticisms of Prop. 63 is why pick on them? Why just the super-rich?

“Because they have the capacity to pay it,” says Staglin, whose prize-winning Cabernet Sauvignon goes for $110 a bottle and his chardonnay (when not sold out) for $55.

That extra 1% tax on people bringing home more than $1 million, he says, “is not a significant percentage of their net worth or total income.”

Besides, these folks got a 3.5% tax cut under President Bush, the Prop. 63 camp says. Moreover, the state tax hike could be deducted on federal returns.

Staglin is especially motivated because his son is schizophrenic. Staglin and his wife, Shari, have raised $25 million for mental health causes.

Brandon Staglin, 32, keeps his disease under control with medication -- “a cocktail of anti-psychotic drugs,” says Garen Staglin. “Getting it right takes a lot of very good care. It’s called psychopharmacology. You need to see a competent psychiatrist.”

Good psychiatrists aren’t cheap and they usually don’t hang with the homeless on the street. Brandon was lucky to have rich parents.

“Brandon had returned from his freshman year at Dartmouth,” his father recalls. “He woke up one day and thought half his brain was gone, is how he described it....

“Schizophrenia is a term with a lot of color, but it is a thought disorder. You hear voices and other signals. You’re unable to function consistent with your IQ and capacity....

“It’s genetic, but can skip generations. We didn’t know this was in the family. It came as a bolt from the blue.”

Brandon Staglin wound up graduating from Dartmouth with honors, earning degrees in engineering and anthropology. But he had a relapse after reducing his medication. The drugs had made him drowsy, which is typical. He went back on them and gave up his dream of becoming a space scientist. Now he designs and manages the website for the Staglin Family Vineyard.

There are an estimated 50,000 other, much less fortunate people with mental illnesses who are living on the streets, making up one-third of California’s homeless. Deterring shoppers. Panhandling. Creating stench.

“It’s the single biggest disincentive to development in California’s downtowns,” says Assemblyman Darrell Steinberg (D-Sacramento), a former city councilman and the principal author of Prop. 63.

If the measure passes, predicts Rusty Selix, executive director of the Mental Health Assn. of California, “no one who is mentally ill and now on the street will be on the street in five years. That doesn’t mean there won’t be homeless. But you will see a measurable decline.”

During the Gray Davis administration, Steinberg secured $55 million in annual state funding for a new program that integrates local mental health services for the homeless: shelter, treatment, job training. The Schwarzenegger administration has kept the program, citing its “proven track record of success.”

Problem is, it can treat only about 5,000 people. There are 10 times that many who need it.

Prop. 63 would provide funding, through the counties, to treat virtually all mentally ill homeless. Additionally, it would kick in money to detect and treat budding mental disorders in children.

An estimated 300,000-plus California kids need mental health services but aren’t getting them. There’d also be funds for adult prevention, “innovation,” professional training, shelters and clinics.

Polls show voters supporting this. A mid-month survey by the Times Poll found 54% of likely voters favoring the measure; only 27% against.

A survey by the Public Policy Institute of California found 62% to 24% support.

PPIC Pollster Mark Baldassare explains why, based on focus groups:

“Voters believe these people should be paying more anyway. They just got a tax cut from the federal government....

“It’s amazing how many know that [Gov. Ronald] Reagan closed down state mental hospitals and put all these people on the street. They know that the state has broken a promise and under-funded county mental health programs.”

“Then there’s the question of ‘ballot box budgeting,’ ” the pollster continues, referring to the voters’ habit of setting budget priorities through ballot initiatives. “Far as the voters are concerned, ballot box budgeting is what they should be doing. ‘The people in Sacramento, look at the mess they’ve made.’ ”

Prop. 63 opponents -- like Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger -- imply that if super-high incomes are tapped for mental health services, they can’t be taxed in the future for budget-balancing.

But that revenue should have been bagged two years ago to help prevent borrowing from the future to pay for daily state expenses. Most politicians -- including this governor--haven’t had the courage. And there isn’t any sign they’ve grown a backbone.

So grab the money for a noble, needy cause: Helping mentally ill people escape sleeping under a blanket of newspapers in shopkeepers’ doorways.