One down. One teetering. One full-speed ahead. That's the read on three proposed ballot measures to raise taxes in California and dedicate the money to narrow purposes.

The biggest of the three, a teachers' union-inspired proposal to raise taxes on commercial property and to dedicate much of the money to universal preschool, is already dead. After collecting enough signatures to place the measure on the ballot, the California Teachers Association backed out and decided not to pursue the campaign.

A second measure, sponsored by health-care interests, would raise taxes on phone calls and use the money to pay for emergency-room care. Backers of that initiative are going forward, announcing Monday that they will be submitting signatures this week to qualify it for the ballot. But one major proponent, the California Healthcare Association, which represents hospitals, pulled out of the coalition last week, citing unfavorable polling that suggested the idea would be a loser in November.

The third initiative would slap an income tax surcharge on million-dollar earners to pay for expanding mental health care. Its supporters - Assemblyman Darrell Steinberg and a coalition of mental health clinics and advocates for the mentally ill - have already begun submitting their signatures and say they are fully committed to the campaign ahead.

All three tax measures were driven by a common impulse: a frustration among recipients of public funds who think their cause is important and can't wait for the state to get its fiscal house in order, or for the economy to begin filling public coffers again on the natural. Besides, even if the treasury were healthy again, lawmakers probably would spread any new money more or less evenly across a wide variety of needs, rather than dedicate huge chunks to a few special purposes, as these measures would do.

But the sponsors might have picked the wrong time to go forward.

Voters are never keen on new taxes, and right now they seem especially opposed. Last year's recall election was based in part on anger over an increase in the car tax, and the two candidates who pledged to rescind it - Arnold Schwarzenegger and Tom McClintock - combined to get 62 percent of the vote. On March 2, voters overwhelmingly rejected Proposition 56, which would have made it easier for the Legislature to raise taxes.

The premise behind these three measures, though, is that voters are more likely to approve tax increases if they know where the money is going. That's certainly been proven true in the past, especially at the local level, where the public has been open to tax hikes to pay for schools, transportation and, in some cases, health care. A statewide poll a year ago showed that voters liked the idea of raising property taxes on business to pay for education.

But that was before they heard a campaign against the idea. And while the teachers association and its Hollywood ally, director Rob Reiner, insist their polling was still favorable, they wouldn't have pulled back if they thought they had a good chance of winning. The business community was gearing up for a ferocious campaign against the measure, and it was clearly vulnerable.

The initiative would have amended Proposition 13, the property-tax limitation that voters approved in 1978 and that many still consider sacred. Sure, this change would have applied only to commercial property, raising taxes on land and buildings by 55 percent. But homeowners probably would have concluded that they might be next. Renters were already vulnerable since landlords could have, and probably would have, passed along their tax hikes to tenants.

The proposed phone tax measure, meanwhile, would add a 3 percent surcharge to telephone bills to pay for emergency room care. The rationale? We already pay a small fee to finance the 911 emergency communications system. What good is a 911 call, the backers of this new tax argue, if there's no emergency room to which an ambulance can take you after you make the call?

It will be interesting to see if that one flies. High-powered opponents are already gearing up. SBC, the giant phone company that recently swallowed Pacific Bell, has donated $5 million to an opposition campaign that will be run in part by the team that helped elect Schwarzenegger governor. Business groups, whose members' big phone bills would be hit particularly hard by the tax, also will be opposed. The hospital owners who pulled out of this one might have been practicing some smart political triage.

That leaves the mental-health tax. Its cause is the most sympathetic of the three - who doesn't want to do more to help the mentally ill? - and the measure is the most ingeniously designed. A 1 percent surcharge on millionaires is difficult to campaign against. And then there is the question of who will pay for the opposition - Millionaires against Mental Health? A committee (not by that name) has formed, but it remains to be seen if anybody funds it.

It's possible that amid the commotion over the phone tax and other measures likely to appear on the November ballot, the mental health tax might just sneak through.