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POWs Waiting for Apologies (in National News) API Advisory Commission Visits S.F. (in Bay Area News) Asian Food Markets in the Bay Area (in Business) Lampo Leong's Forces • Contemplation (in A&E) Reasons to Celebrate (in Opinion) School Bond Measure Reaches November Ballot By Associated Press An initiative to reduce the vote requirement for approving local school borrowing in Sacramento, California, has qualified for the November ballot. The measure would require 55 percent of local voters to approve any school construction debt, down from the two-thirds approval currently required. In March, voters narrowly rejected a ballot initiative that would have required only majority approval. Gov. Gray Davis is serving as chairman of the new lobbying effort, after being criticized for not doing enough to support the proposal that failed in March. In a statement last week, Davis called the measure “vital to our commitment to increase fiscal accountability and build the classrooms we need to ease overcrowding and continue classroom size reduction.” He also signed a law that is contingent on voters approving the measure in November. That bill requires two-thirds of the local school board to approve asking voters to increase the district’s debt and sets limits on how much debt is allowed for each district and each taxpayer. Taxpayers for Accountability and Better Schools, which Davis now chairs, claimed it collected more than 1.1 million signatures in less than a month. However, Secretary of State Bill Jones said county election officials projected that supporters gathered 793,415 valid signatures, still more than the 670,816 they needed. The measure requires two annual independent audits to monitor the increased spending, and bars use of the money for salaries or operating expenses. Schools will have to evaluate their district’s class-size and technology needs before asking voters to approve new borrowing. Supporters will emphasize those safeguards and schools’ needs in what Bill Hauck, president of the California Business Roundtable, said will be “an aggressive campaign” to lobby voters between now and election day. The proposal is the fifth and last voter initiative to qualify for the November ballot, though the Legislature can still add its own measures.