Posted on 01/17/2011 10:18:35 AM PST by SmithL
Some big targets were left largely untouched in Gov. Jerry Brown's call for shared sacrifice in his proposed budget.
In his plan to raise $12 billion in taxes, Brown avoided a source of revenue Democrats have been going after for years: oil severance fees. Extra taxes on alcohol, tobacco and the wealthy, also targets of Democrats in recent years, were also bypassed.
And, in a nod to his labor allies, Brown did little to rein in the soaring corrections budget -- a potential area of cost savings that has wide public support -- in a plan that includes sharp cuts to social services and higher education.
It was a bow to political realities, an effort that seems to keep powerful corporate forces on the sidelines and prison guard unions in his corner as Brown seeks to extend everyone else's taxes for five years.
...
A key component to the coalition Brown is building for a tax battle is the powerful prison guard union, which spent $1.8 million on his behalf during the fall campaign. Critics say the proof is in Brown's corrections budget, which he kept largely intact. Even as Brown reduced expenditures by $8.2 billion for the current year budget, he added $395 million to corrections "to fully fund the salary and wages of authorized correctional officers, sergeants and lieutenants," according to Brown's budget summary.
The $9.2 billion corrections budget for the coming fiscal year would remain essentially unchanged from the current year.
"I understand politically why Brown hasn't tried to undo the public employee union model he signed into law" during his first administration, said Lew Uhlers, founder and president of the United States Taxpayer Association. "But he's directly confronting the results of that in his budget decisions because of the high costs they impose on the system."
(Excerpt) Read more at contracostatimes.com ...
Sad that he didn’t step up to the plate on this. The “political reality” is that California is going down the toilet and its now clearer than ever that no one can stop it.
What a joke!
What’s killing California is $700 billion in unfunded state employee pensions.
It’s like trying to put out a forest fire by pi$$ing on it.
Until Californians confront (1) Unions and (2) illegal immigrants every other solution is just a drop in the bucket.
He’s not proposing ONE SINGLE LAY OFF!
Agree!.
In order for them to face reality,
the state must be allowed to go bankrupt.
At this point, they are released from contractual obligations, like paying “public” employees to retire at 50 at 100+% of their salaries.
Hiring hundreds of teams of auditors to investigate and eliminate the graft and corruption in the California state government would be a honest start followed up by eliminating at least 100 state agencies created as political payoffs!
That makes it clear enough to me. Brown isn’t going to do anything bold or significant. He’s just going to preside over the decline and eventual collapse.
He really can’t. He and the Legislature have been both bought and paid for by those interests that want the status quo.
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