Fresno County Threatens Lawsuit After Governor Forces Transportation Tax Onto November Ballot

Governor Gavin Newsom signed a law Thursday requiring Fresno County to place the Better Roads, Safe Streets transportation tax measure on the November ballot — a move that Fresno County Board of Supervisors Chair Garry Bredefeld immediately vowed to challenge in court.

“The fight has just begun for me,” Bredefeld said at a Thursday morning press conference, hours before the Governor’s signature. He promised to bring a motion for litigation to the board’s Aug. 11 meeting, calling the law “corrupt” and “unconstitutional.”

AB 1923, authored by Assemblymember Esmeralda Soria and co-authored by Senator Anna Caballero, began as a healthcare bill to help distressed hospitals. On Aug. 3, the two lawmakers gutted and rewrote it as an emergency statute forcing any initiative certified sufficient by Fresno County’s Registrar of Voters on or before July 8 onto the November 2026 ballot.

The rewritten bill targets one measure: Better Roads, Safe Streets, a half-cent sales tax meant to replace the county’s expiring Measure C transportation funding. That tax, in place since 1987, generates nearly a quarter-billion dollars yearly for road repairs, transit, and freeway expansion. It expires June 30, 2027.

The measure gathered more than 30,000 signatures to qualify. But on July 14, the Board of Supervisors voted 3-2 to delay placing it on the ballot, ordering a 30-day study that would push final approval past the Aug. 7 deadline to qualify for November — meaning voters wouldn’t see it until March 2028.

Soria and Caballero’s bill overrides that delay. The legislature passed it Aug. 6 along party lines: 27-8 in the Senate, 54-16 in the Assembly. All Republican legislators representing Fresno — Assemblymembers David Tangipa and Alexandra Macedo, and Senator Shannon Grove — voted no. Democrats Soria, Caballero, and Assemblymember Joaquin Arambula voted yes.

“As a former city council member, I deeply value local control,” Soria said on the Assembly floor, “but local control does not belong exclusively to local elected officials; it also belongs to the people.”

Bredefeld, joined by fellow Supervisors Buddy Mendes and Nathan Magsig, Reedley Mayor Matthew Tutler, and Clovis Mayor Pro Tem Diane Pearce, called the law “one of the most brazen attacks on local democracy” he’s seen. Pearce pointed to Alameda County, where supervisors also delayed an initiative with a study request — but faced no state intervention.

“Why can Alameda County perform their duties but Fresno County can’t?” Tangipa asked on the Assembly floor.

County officials say the law violates the state Constitution’s requirements for emergency statutes and tramples election law, which allows boards 30 days to study citizen initiatives. Bredefeld said the county has hired an election-law specialist but did not name them or estimate litigation costs.

Fresno County is already facing department budget cuts and millions in increased costs from federal mandates.

Bredefeld accused Newsom of signing the bill as a favor to the Central Valley Community Foundation, led by former Fresno Mayor Ashley Swearengin. The foundation serves as fiscal sponsor for a nonprofit run by the Governor’s wife, and this year collected $230,000 in behested payments — legal but criticized donations directed by an officeholder — at Newsom’s direction.

“Governor Newsom signed AB 1923 — a corrupt, unconstitutional bill that overrides the will of Fresno County’s locally elected representatives to benefit his political allies and Ashley Swearengin’s organization that has been funneling money to his wife’s charity,” Bredefeld said in a statement after the signing.

Bredefeld described the bill as a “30 year tax scheme designed to get people out of their cars and ride public transportation. It will not fix all the roads needed to be fixed throughout Fresno County. I will never support a tax measure that does not fulfill its promises to our residents. This measure also requires 120 miles of bike lanes throughout the County and would give a citizens committee oversight over the $7 BILLION it would generate. This committee would be appointed by the same people who allowed the whole process to be hijacked by radicals and there would be no real accountability to the public.”

The Better Roads campaign called the law’s passage a victory. “We look forward to talking directly with voters in the months ahead,” their statement read, thanking Soria and Caballero “for standing up for the basic democratic principle that people should decide the issues that shape their future.”

Supervisor Luis Chavez, the board’s vice chair, endorsed the bill Thursday. The measure is backed by 11 of the county’s 15 mayors, advocacy groups, and nonprofits across party lines.

Mendes criticized the coalition as “left-leaning” despite its bipartisan makeup, and accused supporters of sabotaging earlier renewal efforts. He and Bredefeld have called the coalition a “cabal” “bending the knee” to Swearengin.

If the measure can’t be kept off the ballot, Bredefeld said, “we’re going to make sure we defeat this piece of shit because it is not right for the people.”

After AB 1923’s passage, the City of Fresno withdrew its own proposed general tax meant to replace Measure C revenue if the county measure failed.

The Breakdown

• AB 1923 mandates Fresno County place the Better Roads, Safe Streets half-cent sales tax on the November 2026 ballot, overriding the Board of Supervisors’ July delay.
• The measure would replace Measure C, which expires June 2027 and currently funds nearly $250 million yearly in road repairs, transit, and freeway projects.
• The Fresno County Board voted 3-2 in July to delay the measure for a 30-day study, pushing placement past the Aug. 7 deadline and off the November ballot until 2028.
• Soria and Caballero rewrote a healthcare bill Aug. 3 as an emergency statute forcing the measure onto November’s ballot. The legislature passed it Aug. 6; Governor Newsom signed it Aug. 7.
• Supervisor Bredefeld plans to ask the board Aug. 11 to sue the state, alleging the law violates constitutional and election-code requirements.

What This Means for You

You’ll vote on the Better Roads tax in November — a decision that will shape road funding and transit service across the county. The supervisors you elected to oversee the county just lost a procedural fight with the state lawmakers and Governor you also elected, and now plan to spend public money suing the state over it. The measure itself is unchanged — a half-cent sales tax replacing the one that’s funded local transportation since 1987 — but is the new bill in the best interests of Fresno County residents and voters?

What You Can Do

The Fresno County Board of Supervisors meets Aug. 11 to vote on authorizing the lawsuit Bredefeld announced. That meeting is your chance to weigh in on whether the county should spend money litigating the state’s overreach. Contact information for the board and meeting details are available at fresnocountyca.gov. The Better Roads campaign has invited residents to join their outreach efforts as the November vote approaches — details at betterroadssafestreets.com.

What to Watch

Bredefeld says litigation is coming, but hasn’t said what it will cost. If the lawsuit goes forward, watch whether it’s a real legal challenge or a symbolic gesture that burns through a budget the county claims is already strained. Either way, you’re paying for it.

When a bill has this much resistance, perhaps it is time to start looking in to what exactly might be worthy of attention.

Beyond the lawsuit: the actual policy question here is whether a half-cent sales tax is the right way to fund transportation in a county where wages are low and cost-of-living is rising. A sales tax is regressive — it takes the same percentage from every dollar spent, which means it hits hardest on people who spend the largest share of their income just getting by. Fresno County is one of the poorest regions in California. That’s a voter judgment, not a lawsuit.