A plan to divide California into three states will appear on the November ballot after the campaign received more than 600,000 signatures.
The initiative, often referred to as “Cal-3,” was sponsored by billionaire venture capitalist Tim Draper.
The state would be divided into California, Northern California, and Southern California.
The proposal would split America’s largest state into three: California would be reduced to a coastal strip running south from Monterey to just past Los Angeles.
The Bay Area would be part of a new Northern California state with a border that starts north of Monterey, runs east and north to the Nevada state line, and includes everything north to the Oregon border.
A new Southern California state would run south from the Northern California border, skirt around the coast from Monterey past Los Angeles, and include San Diego, Death Valley and the rest of the state east to Nevada and Arizona. (Mercury News)
Even if voters embrace the radical plan, it wouldn’t take effect without congressional approval.
“This isn’t as easy or straightforward as its supporters want to make out,” Shaun Bowler, a political science professor at UC Riverside, told Mercury News.
Nevertheless, Draper has argued it’s necessary to fix the state government.
“California government has rotted,” he told Mercury News last month. “We need to empower our population to improve their government.”
Not many Californians are on board thus far, however. A recent survey found that only 17 percent of registered voters in the state favor the plan while 72 percent oppose it.