by Roger Riffenburgh
Bill Shireman is an entrepreneur and civic innovator who is running for state Board of Equalization in District 2. He will work for tax administration to be honest and fair while defending the safeguards of Proposition 13.
In his official candidate statement, Shireman says, “On the Board of Equalization, I will be a fiscal conservative with a conscience: – Defending taxpayers from unfair assessments, – Promoting housing affordability and opportunity, – Ensuring taxes are administered competently and transparently, and – Fixing the system so we can cut and shift taxes to do more with less.” He wants to see the tax system reformed so that instead of taxing good things like work and construction, it would tax bad things like pollution, speculation, and blight.
Bill Shireman’s career has been focused on getting disparate groups to work together towards policy improvements, mostly in the environmental area. One of his prominent successes was his work on the “bottle bill” in 1986 setting up California’s system for recycling beverage containers. An unlikely coalition of Coors, Safeway, and the Sierra Club joined forces to pass the legislation. Bill Shireman says, “I resolve conflicts between groups that often love to hate each other: conservatives, progressives, capitalists, and activists. I don’t ask them to compromise their ideals. I help them realize them, together.”
Bill Shireman is CEO and President of the company Solution Citizen, where he helps “donors, companies, causes, and campaigns advance pragmatic solutions to climate change and other intractable wedge issues.” Shireman is also Founder and President of the non-profit Future 500, which says “We find common ground for the common good”. They try to depolarize stakeholders and work collaboratively to advance positive change. Shireman has also taught leadership and negotiations at the Haas Business School at UC Berkeley and written seven books.
The Republican Party has benefitted from Shireman’s energy and leadership. He serves as an officer of the Lincoln Club of Northern California and a member of his county central committee and has served as a delegate to the state GOP.
The California Board of Equalization (BoE) oversees property tax administration, ensures uniform assessments across counties, and acts as an appellate body for certain tax disputes. It is the only publicly elected tax commission in the country, consisting of four members elected by district plus the State Controller. BoE District 2 contains coastal and coastal-adjacent counties all the way south from the Oregon border to Ventura County. It includes all Bay Area counties except Solano.
Bill Shireman grew up in Sunnyvale. He earned his bachelor’s degree at the University of California Berkeley in Journalism. He founded the Future 500 in 1996. He lives in San Francisco with his wife and two children. You can learn more about Bill Shireman on his campaign website, BillShiremanforCalifornia.com .