Which cities are counting on the potential green from California’s new cash crop?

Time was when government types shunned marijuana, the wacky weed that threatened to lead America’s youth down the road to ruin and reefer madness.

But since California voters in 2016 legalized adult dope-smoking just for fun, local government officials have rushed to get in on what they see as a potential windfall in tax revenue.

Morgan Hill, Mountain View, Santa Clara, Emeryville, Union City, Daly City, Half Moon Bay, Redwood City, San Carlos, South San Francisco, San Francisco and Contra Costa County all have cannabis tax measures on the November ballot.

Why are tech titans jawing over San Francisco’s homeless problem?

Things have to get really bad for business executives to spend big money promoting a costly tax on their companies. Welcome to San Francisco, where piles of human waste and discarded drug needles from legions of homeless people are making more of an impression lately than the city’s scenic bridges, towers and trolleys.

Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff finally had enough, and has pledged more than $1.5 million toward passage of Proposition C on the city ballot, a gross-receipts business tax on revenue over $50 million to fund shelter and services for the homeless. It would raise some $300 million a year.

Not all of Benioff’s fellow tech moguls in the city are on board. Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey and Stripe CEO Patrick Collison have sparred with Benioff on social media (where else?!) over whether Prop C is the answer.

What do hotel stays, vacant lots and utility bills all have in common?

Pot and heads aren’t the only thing The Man wants to tax. The economy’s good, and local governments figure voters won’t mind a bigger pinch in the pocketbook. So revenue measures abound.

Hotel taxes that make a night’s stay more costly are on the ballot in 14 Bay Area cities, including Los Altos, Palo Alto, Morgan Hill, Sunnyvale, Milpitas, Sausalito, South San Francisco, Daly City, Foster City, San Carlos, Belmont and even Colma.

New or extended sales taxes that make everything you buy more expensive are on the ballot for Santa Clara County, San Mateo County Transit District, Marin Transportation Authority, Los Gatos, Redwood City, Alameda, Albany, Antioch and Martinez.

Other taxes on businesses, utility users, property transfers, vacant property, paramedic service are on the ballot in Berkeley, Hayward, Oakland, Union City, El Cerrito, Pinole, Richmond, Daly City, Larkspur, Sausalito, Corte Madera, Fairfax, Ross and San Anselmo.

And there are parcel taxes and bond measures in Campbell, San Jose, East Palo Alto, Millbrae, Albany, Berkeley, Oakland, as well as school and special districts throughout the Bay Area.

Will voters in Palo Alto and Livermore start a trend to control health care costs?

Measure F in Palo Alto and Measure U in Livermore say they will limit what hospitals and other health care providers can bill patients and their insurers.

The measures would prohibit them from charging more than 15 percent above the actual cost of care. At a time when it costs more and more every year to buy insurance and see a doctor, that’s a compelling pitch.

But foes like Stanford Health Care say the effort is a wolf in sheep’s clothing, the wolf being the SEIU-UHW union that is sponsoring the measures, plus a similar statewide ballot initiative for dialysis clinics, Proposition 8.

Critics say health care providers lose money treating the poor and elderly on Medi-Cal and Medicare, and rely on higher rates for insured patients to stay solvent. Should the measure pass, they warn, hospitals would be forced to cut costs by reducing staffing, pay and benefits.

Will San Jose voters tax themselves to fund an affordable housing plan?

It costs too much to live here. Can the government help? San Jose’s Measure V is a $450 million bond measure to fund affordable housing.

City leaders who put it on the ballot say it will provide relief for middleclass people struggling to pay for a place to live in one of America’s least affordable cities.

They say it will help “leverage” federal, state and private funding to build more affordable housing.

If approved by twothirds of voters, it would cost property owners $41 a year per $500,000 of assessed value over 40 years, and renters would likely see those costs passed on to them as well.

Critics like the Silicon Valley Taxpayers Association argue making housing more expensive with bond payments isn’t helping, and blame high housing costs on government red tape.

Berkeley has its own $135 million bond measure aimed at affordable housing.

This comes on top of Proposition 1, a statewide $4 billion affordable housing and veteran homeownership bond measure.

Will Oakland voters back Mayor Libby Schaaf for another term?

Two of the Bay Area’s three big-city mayors can rest easy this fall. San Jose Mayor Sam Liccardo and San Francisco Mayor London Breed won in June.

That leaves Oakland’s Libby Schaaf, who has drawn nine re-election opponents. Since Schaaf took office in 2015 there has been the deadly 2016 Ghost Ship fire exposing deficiencies in city fire safety inspections. There was a police sex scandal and succession of new chiefs. The Warriors and Raiders teams are leaving, and the Athletics’ ballpark plan is mired in uncertainty. The city’s finances remain a mess.

But Schaaf, who succeeded the unpopular Jean Quan, faces a comparatively weak field of challengers to her left, the most prominent of which is Cat Brooks, who has been criticized for divisive protest tactics. Schaaf has been credited for a more realistic view than her rivals of the challenges facing her city, as well as being a visible Oakland booster unafraid to take a tough stand. She was criticized nationally — most prominently by the Trump administration — for jeopardizing public safety by warning of imminent federal immigration sweeps, a move that no doubt boosted her appeal locally.

Oakland’s “ranked choice” voting system complicates matters as voters may be encouraged to take chances on long-shot contenders.

Can a teenager claim a seat on a local school board?

There’s been a lot of talk about getting young people involved in politics. One place that’s working is Antioch, where Shagoofa Khan, 18, and Ellie Householder, 25, are among six contenders for two open seats on the five-member Antioch Unified School District board. They consider themselves running mates, a youth slate.

Their rivals include former mayor and school trustee Mary Rocha, retired banker Jim Davis, 20-year school volunteer Candida Gonzalez-Amigo and Clyde Lewis Jr., a parent and education administrator.

Khan, who is starting at Los Medanos College, said she and Householder, an educational consultant, share similar goals of improving school facilities, teacher diversity and student achievement.

Why are San Jose’s mayor and city council relinquishing the power to set their own salaries?

Elections are usually about who governs, not who decides their pay. But San Jose leaders are asking city voters to remove the mayor and council members’ authority to decide their own salaries.

They have framed their proposed Measure U charter amendment as a reform to prevent elected officials from hiking up their own pay.

But their concern is quite the opposite. Currently, an appointed city commission recommends salary increases for the mayor and council, which votes whether to accept them or something less.

City leaders want those raises, but don’t want their own fingerprints on them. If approved, Measure U would leave the council pay decision in the commissioners’ hands.

The city’s current system is much like San Diego’s, while the proposed changes would be similar to the way it’s done in San Francisco, Oakland and Sacramento.