Cal. Const., art. XVI, § 18 · Article XVI. PUBLIC FINANCE
Cal. Const., art. XVI, § 18
Text — As published in the Legislative Counsel's database, tables dated October 18, 2026 (pubinfo_2025.zip)
(a) No county, city, town, township, board of education, or school district, shall incur any indebtedness or liability in any manner or for any purpose exceeding in any year the income and revenue provided for such year, without the assent of two-thirds of the voters of the public entity voting at an election to be held for that purpose, except that with respect to any such public entity which is authorized to incur indebtedness for public school purposes, any proposition for the incurrence of indebtedness in the form of general obligation bonds for the purpose of repairing, reconstructing or replacing public school buildings determined, in the manner prescribed by law, to be structurally unsafe for school use, shall be adopted upon the approval of a majority of the voters of the public entity voting on the proposition at such election; nor unless before or at the time of incurring such indebtedness provision shall be made for the collection of an annual tax sufficient to pay the interest on such indebtedness as it falls due, and to provide for a sinking fund for the payment of the principal thereof, on or before maturity, which shall not exceed forty years from the time of contracting the indebtedness.
(b) Notwithstanding subdivision (a), on or after the effective date of the measure adding this subdivision, in the case of any school district, community college district, or county office of education, any proposition for the incurrence of indebtedness in the form of general obligation bonds for the construction, reconstruction, rehabilitation, or replacement of school facilities, including the furnishing and equipping of school facilities, or the acquisition or lease of real property for school facilities, shall be adopted upon the approval of 55 percent of the voters of the district or county, as appropriate, voting on the proposition at an election. This subdivision shall apply only to a proposition for the incurrence of indebtedness in the form of general obligation bonds for the purposes specified in this subdivision if the proposition meets all of the accountability requirements of paragraph (3) of subdivision (b) of Section 1 of Article XIII A.
(c) When two or more propositions for incurring any indebtedness or liability are submitted at the same election, the votes cast for and against each proposition shall be counted separately, and when two-thirds or a majority or 55 percent of the voters, as the case may be, voting on any one of those propositions, vote in favor thereof, the proposition shall be deemed adopted.
Notes and commentary — not constitutional text
History
Sec. 18 amended Nov. 7, 2000, by Prop. 39. Initiative measure.
Source of truth
- Edition
- As published in the Legislative Counsel's database, tables dated October 18, 2026 (pubinfo_2025.zip)
- Official file
- https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/codes_displaySection.xhtml?lawCode=CONS§ionNum=SEC.%2018.&article=XVI
- Text hash
- sha256 60607041dc866946fb1620ea639480b5e311beef646b34218debbf933061c4b6
- Composed by
- compose_ca.py 2026-10-22: the Legislative Counsel's CAML content files read by a tokenizer (caml_readers.reader_a); an independent xml.etree reading (caml_readers.reader_b) agrees on every section
This section cites
Provisions in this library that the text above cites, as it prints each citation. A range cited as “ss. 61.13-61.16” links its first and last provisions.
California Constitution
Cited by 10 provisions
Provisions in this library whose text cites Cal. Const., art. XVI, § 18. Each shows the citation as that text prints it.
Education Code
- Ed. Code, § 15266Printed as Section 18 of Article XVI of the California Constitution
- Ed. Code, § 15268Printed as Section 18 of Article XVI of the California Constitution
- Ed. Code, § 15270Printed as Section 18 of Article XVI of the California Constitution
- Ed. Code, § 15274Printed as Section 18 of Article XVI of the California Constitution
- Ed. Code, § 15278Printed as Section 18 of Article XVI of the California Constitution
- Ed. Code, § 15284Printed as Section 18 of Article XVI of the California Constitution
- Ed. Code, § 81520Printed as Section 18 of Article XVI of the California Constitution
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