As a newly appointed committee moves to implement Proposition 71, the stem-cell research initiative approved by voters last month, some of its most effusive backers have become critics.
State senator Deborah Ortiz, a vocal supporter of Prop. 71, now says the voter-approved measure has gaping holes. In fact, Ortiz has introduced a legislative package she describes as "a starting point to provide public accountability under Proposition 71."
The legislation would force stem-cell grantees to make treatments affordable for low-income residents, allow the state to share in profits from publicly financed discoveries, protect women who donate their eggs for research purposes, and increase accountability for the committee charged with overseeing the state's new Institute for Regenerative Medicine.
Such concerns were voiced before the election by women's rights advocates, fiscal watchdogs, and bioethicists. They said the measure lacked proper safeguards and might amount to a giveaway to the biotech industry without ensuring that therapies would be affordable or ethical (see "Cell Divide," 9/29/04).
They also warned that some fancy wording could bar legislators from tinkering with the voter-approved law in its first three years – a problem Ortiz is now confronting. Her spokesperson Hallye Jordan described the requirements for changes as "difficult, if not impossible" but said her office is working with legislative counsel to find a way to get around them.
"In the meantime the senator is hopeful that the [Prop. 71 stem-cell committee] will adopt many of these guidelines as their own," Jordan told the Bay Guardian.
But why did Ortiz support a measure that contained so many flaws?
"Now that the initiative has passed – and she's happy about that – she wants to make sure that there is public accountability," Jordan said. "She wants the public to be confident that they made the right vote."
Ortiz isn't the only one demonstrating new skepticism about Prop. 71. Two of the state's major newspapers, the San Francisco Chronicle and the Los Angeles Times, which both endorsed the proposition, are exploring aspects of it they ignored prior to the election.
Attorney Debra Greenfield, a member of the Pro-Choice Alliance Against Prop. 71, is disheartened that these papers waited so long to look into the details of Prop. 71. "My greatest frustration is with the liberal media, who wanted to make this about George Bush [and missed other aspects of the measure]," she told us.
While the Times has basically dug a little deeper into the initiative over the past month, unearthing specifics that it passed over before Prop. 71 became state law, the Chronicle's whole attitude seems to have shifted.
Before the election, the Chronicle's Prop. 71 coverage tended to emphasize the Catholic Church's reservations about using cells from embryos above any other criticism of the measure. Finally, on Oct. 15 the paper reported that "many of the most vocal critics of Prop. 71 say they are in favor of stem-cell research but oppose the public financing and oversight provisions in the measure."
But the Chronicle has used much stronger language in a recent series of stories concerning the committee's first meeting Dec. 17 at UCSF. Just two days after the election, a story emphasized that "the long-sought disease cures and business boom dangled before voters as potential benefits of Prop. 71 could be years in coming."
And the Chronicle has made a big deal of the selection of campaign chair (and real estate developer) Robert Klein as head of the stem-cell committee, even though criticism that the criteria for the position closely mirrored Klein's own background went unexplored before Nov. 2.
Most abashedly, on Dec. 8 the Chronicle ran a story headlined "Prop. 71's Fine Print Contains Surprises" that noted that the initiative "may have constructed a bulwark against oversight or modification by state elected officials" and that some of the dollars allocated might not go directly to stem-cell studies.
The paper said these flaws might have escaped "voters who didn't read [the proposition]."
It's true that the text of Prop. 71 was long and dense. But if anyone should be expected to take the time to read the fine print, it's the staff at one of the state's biggest newspapers.
When we asked Steve Proctor, the Chronicle's deputy managing editor for news, why his paper didn't report on these controversies before the election, he said, "It's fair criticism to say we should have done more aggressive research into the initiative and looked further into the bill prior to the election." He also pointed out, "As something becomes a reality, you delve into it more deeply."
Meanwhile, the paper's editorial perspective on Prop. 71 also seems to have changed. The Chronicle came out strongly in favor of Prop. 71 a full month before Election Day.
But the editorial page's next mention of the initiative was a Dec. 9 editorial backing Ortiz's legislation. It said the state should share in profits biotech companies reap because of the initiative (an issue that went unaddressed in the original endorsement). "Remarkably, the initiative makes no provision for the state to share directly in the wealth that might be generated by the project," the editorial stated. "It seems only reasonable that the public should share in some of the financial rewards."
This issue was evident prior to the election, of course, though you wouldn't know it from reading the Chronicle. Editorial page editor John Diaz didn't return calls seeking comment.
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