"I think they have a really good feeling that this is the guy who goes into a room on Sunday night as kind of the 'Daddy of California' with a checkbook to pay all the bills."

◼ SEIU president tells Jerry Brown's tax-plan rivals to step aside - Sacramento Bee

Powerful labor leader David Kieffer says proponents of tax measures competing with Gov. Jerry Brown's measure should get out of the way.

Kieffer, head of Service Employees International Union California, has begun breaking his union's silence on Brown's tax plan after the group had quietly pledged support weeks ago.

"I think people do really feel like he's the adult in the room who would take the resources that the state voters have given him and be prudent with it," Kieffer said in a recent interview. "I think they have a really good feeling that this is the guy who goes into a room on Sunday night as kind of the 'Daddy of California' with a checkbook to pay all the bills."

Brown has proposed raising income taxes on the wealthy and hiking the sales tax by a half-cent to help balance the budget and avoid school cuts. He has tried to discourage proponents of two other multibillion-dollar tax measures from qualifying their initiatives for the November ballot, but those groups have raised hundreds of thousands of dollars to gather signatures and shown no sign of stepping aside.

Keiffer said that SEIU, which represents government workers and home care providers, sees Brown's plan as the best one to raise money for the entire state budget. The other proposals mostly raise funds outside the state budget to benefit education and county programs.