Posted on 07/24/2009 6:54:54 PM PDT by NormsRevenge
SACRAMENTO, Calif. – Lawmakers on Friday approved a complex package of spending cuts, accounting maneuvers and raids on local government coffers to fill California's gigantic budget deficit, providing hope that the state might begin a slow climb out of a deep financial hole.
...
The cuts imposed by the Legislature are extraordinary. The deal will mean teachers are laid off, college students will pay more, parks will be closed, and office buildings will be sold off. Lawmakers agreed the scope of the cuts was distasteful, but most said they had little choice.
"The only way to do it is to spread the sacrifice. That is why this budget is an acceptable budget to me, it saves our state from financial ruin and from drowning into the fiscal abyss," Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger said, adding he was pleased that they avoided passing tax increases. "We have endured the darkest of storms and the harshest of winds. ... We have emerged battered and bruised, but we are intact and we are still standing."
(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...
Nest year, it will be worse.
Last week on NPR I heard that there are calls for a new Constitutional Convention for CA. The restrictions on taxation and the outlawing of gay marriage are the reasons they want to shed the government and impose a new one.
Has anyone else heard of this?
There was some rumblings earlier this year, nothing solid so far.
Now that this latest debacle is over for now, that may pick up even more.
I’m all for the gays to take over SF, and do their thing... oops, of course, they will run out of people since they can’t do the “having children” thing right.
California is reaping...
Arnold should have pulled that knife the day he took office ;-)
No freeper has been able to come up with the answers to these questions yet (posted on at least four California threads), and the Democrat newsrooms sure are not going to provide them, but if anybody has a GOP contact in California, I would appreciate knowing the following:
1. What was the total $ amount of California’s budget last year?, and
2. What is the total $ amount of California new budget this year?
1. minus 2. = total $ amount of “devastating cuts”.
Thanks in advance to anybody who can dredge up this info!
The deal will mean teachers are laid off, college students will pay more, parks will be closed, and office buildings will be sold off.
Oh, the humanity! (of course illegals will still be served breakfast in bed).
One of those gimmicks was to defer state employee paychecks by one day, from June 30 to July 1, 2010, for a savings on paper of $1.2 billion. The state also will accelerate collection of 2010 personal income and corporate taxes to bring in revenue earlier than anticipated.
LOL, it's smoke and mirrors again!
The obvious question is: Why not "defer" state employee paychecks by, say, 5 days and "save" $6 billion (on paper)?
LOL!....with their spending habits, balacing is just an act.
vaudine
Whatever, idiot.
California state employees are too numerous and GROSSLY OVERPAID. Smoke and mirrors is right.
Bankrupt by next year.
Local government entities from around the state, (including counties, cities, and school districts,) are angry about the dysfunctional relationship they have with State government. Some think that issues such as a repeated reallocation of local government funding to the State budget; a State budget that is habitually late; voter initiatives that take away budget flexibility; gerrymandered legislative districts; hijacking of the initiative process by special interests; unfunded mandates and program directives are all symptomatic of the fact that California’s system of government is broken.
“Repair California” has been meeting with elected local officials and others to get them behind a movement calling for a limited constitutional convention to re-craft the 130 year old California Constitution. http://www.repaircalifornia.org/
That convention seems like an over-kill solution. It is almost like Obama care, in that it can cause more problems that it hopes, repeat: hopes, to solve.
That is scary (as a non-californian), but If I were one (and in a conservative leaning county): and the libs tried to re-invent the constitution, I’d do what West Virgina did: Push to free myself from that boondogle!
It appears to have some momentum. The California State Association of Counties (CSAC) and the League of Cities are discussing it. Repair California proposes to have two initiatives on the ballot in November 2010. The first would amend the current constitution to allow for a convention called by the People. The second would outline how delegates would be chosen, rules for the convention, administration, etc. They plan on a 2011 convention, with a single initiative for the new constitution on the ballot in 2012.
I’m not sure yet whether I support it. It’s a crap shoot what we might get - regional government and abolishment of counties, dominance of the city areas, loss of individual rights, centralization of the land use planning function - who knows.
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