Tag Archives: state budget

Vote No on Proposition 31: Changes to State Budgeting

This is the second part of a series of posts analyzing California’s propositions:

Good Intentions…

Proposition 31 is a well-intentioned proposition. Unlike several of the propositions out there today, it’s not funded by special interests or companies looking to make a profit.

More below.

It’s a proposition funded by California Forward, a group legitimately dedicated to reforming California’s budget. The folks at California Forward put a lot of time and thought into drafting this proposition; it’s basically a collection of reforms in the budgeting process that they think would best help the state.

Moreover, there are good things in Proposition 31. For instance, the two-year budget cycle contained in the proposition sounds like a good idea.

But I Don’t Understand It!

California has lots of propositions, and they generally do more bad than good. Indeed, a wise voter ought to reject the good majority of propositions that are put forward each year. That’s the philosophy that informs the approach this blog takes towards propositions.

A wise voter ought to be especially cautious with a proposition he or she doesn’t understand. If you don’t understand what a proposition does, or if you’re extremely confused by its wording, you should almost always vote no.

This proposition is both extremely complicated and quite confusing. There are a lot of big changes which have big, unknown effects on the state budget. The legislative analyst writes that the fiscal effects “cannot be predicted” quite a bit in its analysis. That’s worrying.

Take one part of the proposal. The proposition shifts quite a lot of authority to local governments. For instance:

Under this measure, counties and other local governments (such as cities, school districts, community college districts, and special districts) could create plans for coordinating how they provide services to the public. The plans could address how local governments deliver services in many areas, including economic development, education, social services, public safety, and public health. Each plan would have to be approved by the governing boards of the (1) county, (2) school districts serving a majority of the county’s students, and (3) other local governments representing a majority of the county’s population. Local agencies would receive some funding from the state to implement the plans (as described below).

There’s a ton of information packed into this short paragraph.

This change is made under the assumption that local goverments are more efficient. If it were proposed in the legislature lawmakers and their staff would probably have access to studies, surveys, and analyses on whether or not local governments actually are more efficient than the state government. Those studies and analyses would probably run up into the dozens of pages.

But voters just have this short little paragraph on one facet of the many facets of Proposition 31. For such a major change, it’s not enough.

Perhaps all the changes in Proposition 31 would be of great benefit. Perhaps they would be of great damage. I don’t know, especially since I have such a hard time understanding Proposition 31.

That’s why Californians should vote no on Proposition 31, come November 2012.

–inoljt

California’s Legislators Can Resuscitate the Master Plan

This week’s budget endgame presents leaders in the Senate and Assembly with a rare opportunity to stand up for the California Master Plan for Higher Education by challenging the financial incentive that UC campuses now have to enroll non-resident students in place of Californians.

UC describes this policy as though it were self-evident: each campus gets to “keep” the money it generates from non-resident students. But until 2007, out-of-state tuition revenues went to the UC system as a whole, and before the 1990s they went right back to the state. So, we have here a relatively recent policy change in which UC’s central administration is giving individual campuses the incentive to compete against each other for the non-resident students by giving them the entire revenue difference, which is currently in excess of $20,000 per student -the amount by which out-of-state tuition exceeds the sum of in-state tuition, plus state support. This policy change explains why some mature UC campuses such as UC Berkeley and UCLA for example, now expect to have undergrad enrollments that are over 35% out-of-state at the same time that some younger campuses will struggle to exceed their present 2%. The expected result of this competition for non-resident students will be a growing budgetary disadvantage for those campuses that bear the brunt of UC’s enrollment responsibilities under the Master Plan.

There is no reason for Democrats or Republicans in the California legislature to acquiesce in UC’s decision to provide a lower budgeted quality of education to students on campuses that enroll a higher proportion of California residents. Legislators could easily demand that UC pool the $20,000 in surplus funds it collects from out-of-staters for the purpose of reducing the funding gaps among campuses. This demand could be tied to UC’s annual Memorandum of Understanding with the state about the funding of in-state students.

Why not, for example, get UC to agree that any difference in net enrollment revenue brought in by non-resident students be redistributed to the campuses on an equal per student basis without regard to the proportion of non-resident students on that campus?

Such an approach would treat UC’s surplus revenue from non-residents as the functional equivalent of public revenue collected by the University to replace lost revenue from California taxpayers. If the University says it needs this revenue for this very reason, why shouldn’t California taxpayers take in interest in how such revenue is used to support UC’s public purpose? It is entirely reasonable for legislators to demand, for example, that the tuition surplus generated by out-of state students be used to subsidize the quality of education on all UC campuses, especially in bad budget years, so that California residents do not suffer disproportionately from cuts in state funding on the campuses that still admit them. There would be no unfairness to non-resident students if campuses on which they enrolled were allowed to keep (or get back) the same amount of revenue they would get for enrolling a resident-no more, but no less.

Putting UC’s non-resident tuition on the table alongside state funds is entirely consistent with past practice.

UC’s own recent study of its funding streams points out that:

[h]istorically the State paid greater attention to UC’s non-State sources of revenues. The view of the State was that, to some degree, revenues UC generated from student fee and tuition charges…should reimburse the State for its past investment in UC. …For many years, State funding for UC was offset by any increases in funding from these other non-State sources. (University of California Funding Streams Proposal, 12/21/2010, p. 5)

Only in the 1990s, as a result of annual budget negotiations with the state (including so-called “partnerships” and “compacts”) were these offsets eliminated. There would thus be no legal barrier to reimposing them if UC does not agree to use any surplus revenue from non-resident tuition to offset the systemwide loss of taxpayer funding from the state.

Recapturing this surplus revenue to support instructional quality across the UC system would not cost the state anything, but it would be a large step toward reducing the budgetary disparities among UC campuses reported by the State Auditor in July 2011 (http://www.auditor.ca.gov/pdfs/reports/2010-105.pdf ).This report confirmed and extended my own 2009 finding of glaring inequities in UC’s return to the campuses of funds generated by in-state enrollments (http://keepcaliforniaspromise.org/wp-content/uploads/2009/11/Where-Does-UC-Tuition-Go.pdf ). At that time (when tuition was still around $7,000), UCLA was getting back $7,000 more than each of its in-state students generated in tuition plus state funds and UC Merced was getting about $7,000 less. Since 2009, UC has largely corrected this problem with respect to the tuition component of in-state funding, but it has not yet said how much or how soon it will “rebench” (which might or might not mean “equalize”) its distribution of the $2Billion in state funding that it receives to educate Californians. Just last week, two faculty members of the “Rebenching Implementation Task Force” criticized UC’s administration for delaying action on the Academic Senate’s recommendation of a more equal distribution to campuses of state funding generated by resident students (http://www.universityofcalifornia.edu/senate/ITFFinal_080211.pdf ).

They believe it was a fundamental error to delay rebenching while UC is speeding up the process by which richer campuses are allowed to capture the entire surplus revenue generated for the system by its growing proportion of out-of-state students. The result of untethering these two processes, they say, will be to widen the per-student funding gaps among campuses that rebenching was supposed to narrow.

Based on the State Auditor’s report alone, California’s legislators should require that UC’s out-of-state tuition surplus be pooled among campuses until UC can satisfactorily account for its use of funds appropriated to educate Californians.

This year’s budget process gives legislative leaders a chance to say that UC’s increasing reliance on revenues from non-Californians should not be used to accelerate the path toward fragmentation of the UC system by allowing some campuses to privatize their enrollments more than others. Legislators have this opportunity because, for the first time in living memory the Governor’s budget is no longer hostage to the 2/3 requirement. He must now either sign a budget passed by the majority party or negotiate proposed changes with it.

UC is already lobbying for changes that would make it no more publicly accountable for its use of state funds than it currently claims to be for its use of non-resident tuition.  UC is calling this their “Debt Restructuring” proposal when in reality, it should be called “Debt Privatization”.  A fitting legislative response would be to hold UC accountable for all the funds it raises from enrollments. Requiring UC to treat its surplus revenues from out-of-state enrollments as public funds that help support California students could change the dynamics of future discussions between UC and the taxpayers of California.

Why we are taking a stand against an immoral foreclosure

 By Rose Mary Gudiel  

Last Friday, the moment I had been dreading arrived: my family was served an eviction notice by the Los Angeles County Sheriff Department. OneWest Bank and Fannie Mae believe this is the final chapter of the foreclosure on our family’s home of almost 7 years. But myself, my mother Rosa Maria, my brother Herbert, and my father Miguel have decided that we will not leave. Fannie Mae will not take our family home!

It is hard for us to believe the manner in which we have been treated by first Indy Mac, then One West bank and now Fannie Mae. After the unfortunate passing of our youngest brother, our family fell behind two weeks on our mortgage payment.  During this time, in the wake of the Wall Street meltdown, I was also furloughed from my state job helping others to find employment. It was a miracle that we made it through that time, but we did. We did it by staying focused, working hard, making sacrifices and most importantly coming together as a family.

But my circumstances meant nothing to the bank. OneWest refused my mortgage payment that was just two weeks late. Although three of us have full-time jobs and we are able to pay, they have refused every single payment ever since.   Instead, we’ve been taken on a roller coaster ride of paperwork requests, false promises and denials. It makes no sense.

My parents taught us to work hard, play by the rules and to be good citizens and we have done our best.  It has always been my dream to repay them for all they have given me by buying them a home.  I worked hard and saved money to achieve that dream, and we had a home for our multi-generational family of eight.  We have celebrated Christmases, birthdays and Thanksgiving in this home, so the prospect of losing it to greed and injustice is simply too much to bear.

Stopping preventable foreclosures is better for families, neighborhoods, and our economy. How is it better to flood our neighborhoods with vacant, abandoned foreclosures than to have homeowners keep paying their mortgage and keep up their properties? Or in other cases to sell them at half the price – lower even than a modified mortgage they could offer to me on my own home first?

That’s why we have decided that we are refusing to leave.  We are asking that our eviction be halted and that out loan be modified so we can stay.  But if the sheriff comes first, we are refusing to move.  And we’ll be joined by the hundreds of friends, neighbors, supporters and co-workers that have pledged to stand with us.  

There are thousands of families like ours in California and across the nation.  The greedy, predatory and irresponsible practices of big banks and their rich CEOs caused the economic collapse and foreclosure crisis, destroying millions of American jobs and devastating families like ours.

Yet after getting bailed out by taxpayers, banks today are making billions in profits by continuing to prey on consumers and extract profits from our communities, with no regard for the impact on neighborhoods and people’s economic livelihoods. By holding homeowners underwater and refusing to clean up the foreclosure mess, banks are devastating our neighborhoods, depressing the economy, and preventing millions of working Californians from getting back on their feet.

We are proud to be working with hundreds of families to organize a week of activities to take our fight to the banks to send the message that it’s “time to make Wall Street banks pay.”  We will be calling on banks to keep families in their homes, pay their fair share of taxes and help rebuild hard-hit neighborhoods.  The actions will end on October 6th with a mass mobilization of over a thousand people beginning at California Plaza at 350 South Grand.  

Together, with your support, we will fight to save our American Dream and thousands of other families across the state.  We are not leaving.  Will you stand with us?

Rose Mary Gudiel is a member of ACCE, the Alliance of Californians for Community Empowerment.  For more information about the mobilizations, please visit http://www.makebankspaycalifornia.com

California Forward pushes for final action on budget reform

Nonpartisan reform group asks leaders to make reform part of budget talks

SACRAMENTO-California Forward’s non-partisan leaders today asked legislative leaders to address the long-neglected need for lasting and fundamental budget reform as part of this year’s negotiations over the state budget.

Robert Hertzberg and Thomas McKernan, co-chairs of the reform organization, sent the following letter to the four legislative leaders:

May 12, 2010

The Honorable Darrell Steinberg

President pro Tempore of the Senate

The Honorable John PĂ©rez

Speaker of the Assembly

The Honorable Dennis Hollingsworth

Senate Republican Leader

The Honorable Martin Garrick

Assembly Republican Leader

Dear Legislative Leaders:

California Forward recognizes and deeply appreciates the significant commitment of time and energy that you and the other legislative leaders – as well as individual Assembly members and Senators and your staffs – have devoted to thoughtfully examining our non-partisan plan for comprehensive budget reform.

In both the Senate and the Assembly, members of both parties have been engaged in good-faith discussions and deliberations about how to refine the principles we have identified as key to restoring public confidence in the state’s fiscal operations.  It is particularly noteworthy that these discussions have proceeded even as our proposals have drawn criticism from partisan special interests invested in the status quo and opposed to reform.

As each of you know all too well, another difficult budget season is now upon us.  In our judgment, it is critical that long-term budget reform become part of this year’s budget deliberations.

In the next few days and weeks, each of you will have to grapple with hard choices, and set priorities about the spending of limited public dollars at a time when needs are great and California’s economy remains fragile.

There are no easy answers.  But the current crisis does provide California with the opportunity to finally address the long-neglected need for lasting and fundamental budget reform, and we urge you to take it.

Thanks in no small part to your efforts, this goal is in sight.  In both the Senate and Assembly, real progress has been made in crafting non-partisan reforms based on the best practices of successful businesses and other states, including improved accountability and oversight, better long-term forecasting, setting unexpected windfalls aside, and adopting a pay-as-you-go mechanism for both legislation and initiatives.

Furthermore, our plan provides the first step in rethinking the relationship between state and local government, providing new incentives and resources for communities to start working together to address priorities and bring government closer to the people.

We understand that this work is not yet complete – and that significant hurdles remain before the principles we’ve outlined can garner the bipartisan support necessary to place them before voters in November.

We believe, however, that reform remains our best hope for forestalling future difficulties, and that failing to enact significant reforms this year would only hasten the advent of the next fiscal crisis.

That’s why we ask you to continue to work together to achieve this elusive goal, and urge you to place the reforms we’ve proposed on the ballot.  As always, we stand ready to provide any and all assistance we can in this endeavor, and we would welcome any suggestions you have about other steps we can take to move this process forward.

Very truly yours,

Robert Hertzberg, Co-Chair

California Forward

Thomas V. McKernan, Co-Chair

California Forward

cc:  All Senators and Assembly members

Slow Boil & A Thousand Cuts in the “Golden” State

Most everyone has heard the saying about the frog in the pot on the stove. The heat is raised ever so slowly that the frog doesn’t really notice.

Of course, the frog eventually dies in boiling water.

It’s similar to the Chinese “death by a thousand cuts,” or the term “creeping normalcy,” which refers to major changes that are accepted as normal when they happen slowly.

This all came to mind last week when I read that the local Easter Seals in Humboldt County is closing. Another small cut in our community life, partly due to state budget “trimming.” A few more area residents experiencing a diminishing of their quality of life.

I thought more about this when I went to do a swim work-out at the Arcata Pool. I was remembering my first two years going there on specific nights when patient, caring swimming instructors worked with developmentally disabled youth. They had a great time.

I realized that I hadn’t seen them there in a long time.

Later, while shopping at Wildberries, I noticed a table asking for donations to save HSU’s Natural History Museum. I looked across the street to the darkened windows of this facility that has been such an asset to the community and Humboldt County.

It’s closed now, except for special occasions. Quality of life. Community. Cuts.

Driving back to Eureka, I thought about a person I hadn’t seen at a work meeting that day. She’s always been an active asset to our community and was frequently seen around town.

In her electric wheelchair. She has a disability and she’s a senior. She couldn’t get out of bed that day because she can’t find an IHSS (In-Home Support Services) care provider. Now she’s worried because the Governor has proposed cutting that program altogether and that she might be forced into a nursing home.

Another disabled person I know, who lives in his own apartment thanks to the IHSS program, says he would prefer dying to ending up in a care facility. It’s a matter of quality of life. One more little cut. One more devastated life.

This made me ponder the phone message that I saved at work, from a woman in Orick who was despondent over further state cuts to her meager SSI.

She said that she’d been having to choose between heat and food over the last winter even before recent cuts. I thought of the blog comments I’d seen referring to “deadbeats” to “get a job.” I note the state’s unemployment rate, which will increase significantly if Arnold gets many of his cuts. I thought of the disabled acquaintance who wants to start working through Calworks, also proposed for elimination, and the number of local jobs not available to the disabled because the work sites are not accessible.

These people certainly notice that stove’s been turned up.

The next day a co-worker told me about an agency consumer with schizophrenia who had her prescribed meds eliminated due to MediCal cuts. She’s now in the hospital and not in her own apartment. Quality of life? Hardly. Not to mention a greater cost to the community.

Another degree or two or five on the stove.

I looked at the newspaper that day and read about Eureka City budget deficits and necessary cuts that are partly due to the state “borrowing” money from local governments. Sacramento won’t ask for an oil extraction fee, but your local taxes will subsidize those corporations’ right to a hefty profit.

Cut a policemen here, close a zoo there. Quality of life. Cuts.

I heard about a community in California that is now charging $300 for 9-1-1 calls. Pay up, or your life is forfeit. The commodification of CPR.

I read about 900 teaching positions being slashed in the Bay Area and of police and fire jobs being cut. I thought of protesters yelling about high taxes, but then complaining about the potholes in the road and the slow response by the police to their calls.

I talked to a friend who can’t afford to continue in college and heard someone complain that they took time off to take care of business at a state agency, only to find it closed that day.

Notes to the Eagles “Hotel California” played somewhere in my head, but Don Henley was singing “They’re killing them off at the Hotel California.  It’s so very clear, the common good is long gone here.”

Feel the temperature rising yet? Is the water tepid or just lukewarm? Is that just another paper cut on your finger?

Grover Nordquist once said of government that he would like to “get it down to the size where we can drown it in a bathtub.” Would he be referring to  government that’s for and by the people?

Grover would cheer the Golden State plan being enacted: golden for the chosen few and a rain (trickle down?) of fool’s gold for the rest.

I think of Arnold, with his budget cuts year after year after year. I hear E-Meg regurgitating “no taxes, more cuts, no taxes, more cuts” and signing a no tax pledge during the greatest recession since the Depression. Sure, let’s turn government into a business appendage and run it properly! Just like Enron and Exxon-Mobil and Bank of America, right?

I think of Republican legislators refusing to even discuss raising any taxes and cowed (majority?) Democrats forced to make “the hard decisions” of cutting the budget (just a few more cuts on the arms and legs; just a few degrees up on the stove, just ONE more time).

I think of the state’s citizens saying that just 500 cuts aren’t enough, but PLEASE don’t kill the patient–clinging to their “have our cake and eat it too” belief system while the cupboards are laid bare and the landlord laughs all the way to his barely taxed mansion. Oh no! Prop. 13 was ONLY about saving grandma’s little house in the neighborhood (wink, wink). We can’t EVER touch that!

So one more Easter Seals closes. One more senior becomes homeless. One more person can’t go to college. The death by a thousand cuts, creeping normalcy, frog in the pot–it’s all the same. Elimination of checks and balances, destruction of the common good and civil society, wiping out government “by the people,” reign by the unregulated chaos of free markets on steroids growing into corporate monopolies, and the entrenchment of a new aristocracy mouthing platitudes to the democracy that they’ve bought and sold out.

But…but…we want to save the poor frog, the people whisper. Then they turn away as the forces of corporate rule wielding their subsidiary government arm turn up the heat another notch. They never notice that it’s most all of us inside the pot.

And that many are already scalded. And that we’ll all soon join them.

How State Budget Cuts Affect San Francisco

From today’s Beyond Chron.

It’s official.  With the new state budget, the City is losing more money from Sacramento this year than what we have gained from Washington.  President Obama’s stimulus means that San Francisco is getting $92 million more from the federal government than last year, but the combined February and June budgets from Sacramento took $98 million away.  And that doesn’t count the $109 million in local tax revenue the state will “borrow” from us to balance their budget.

Virtually all the state cuts affect health and human services, making it even more crucial that the Board of Supervisors protect the $43.7 million in “add-back” money they fought so hard to restore.  Mayor Gavin Newsom will propose $18.4 million in unilateral mid-year cuts in response to the state budget, but the deal struck with Budget Chair John Avalos is that he must give the Board a formal chance to weigh in.  And because Supervisor David Campos’ amendment put part of the City budget on reserve, the Board still controls up to $12 million in Police and $6.5 million in Fire Department funds.  It’s time to use that leverage, and revisit those budgets.

Barack Giveth, But Arnold Taketh Away

According to the Mayor’s initial budget proposal on June 1st, San Francisco will get about $92 million more in federal funds this year – largely from the President’s stimulus package.  But even before the state budget was finalized last week, our funding from Sacramento had already been cut by $62 million.  Now, cumulative state cuts to the City from the February and June budgets are at least $98 million, wiping out the federal stimulus.

To plug a $26 billion deficit, the state budget made a total of $15 billion in cuts, and “borrowed” up to $11 billion from local governments.  The state is required by law to “pay back” localities within three years – with interest.  Rather than a balanced approach at solving the budget crisis by passing some revenue, the state simply cut and borrowed.

Here is how the state budget numbers translate for San Francisco, in a preliminary report released by the City Controller: (a) $36.4 million in cuts – almost entirely affecting health and human services, (b) $18.6 million in Redevelopment funds “borrowed” and (c) a $91 million hit in “borrowed” local property tax revenue.  

According to a recent New York Times editorial, California is not alone.  States are in tough times and have to make fiscal sacrifices, with cuts that canceled out most of what they got from the federal stimulus.  “States cannot avoid raising taxes to help balance their budgets,” warned the Times editorial. “But tax increases on high-income residents are less harmful than spending cuts.”

Nevertheless, Governor Schwarzenegger – and the Republicans in the state legislature – refused to support any tax increase whatsoever. They would not repeal $2 billion in corporate tax loopholes that were placed in the February budget, refused to consider an oil severance tax (putting them to the right of Sarah Palin on that issue) and opposed raising the upper-income tax bracket that GOP Governors Ronald Reagan and Pete Wilson agreed to do when the state hit hard times.  Now, cities are left holding the bag.

According to the City Controller, San Francisco can borrow the $108 million it is losing from the state “borrowing” our redevelopment and property tax revenue – so that figure should not translate into immediate budget cuts.  But we still must deal with the $36.4 million in direct state budget cuts.  

The City budget that Mayor Newsom and the Supervisors passed set aside an $18 million “safety cushion” to deal with future state cuts, and this money will now be used to back-fill the impact.  But it means we must find another $18.4 million in cuts (or revenue alternatives) for San Francisco.

State Cuts Leave San Francisco With a Choice

Practically all of the state cuts are in health and human services.  Out of the $36.4 million in direct cuts to San Francisco, $20 million went to the Department of Public Health and $16 million to the Human Services Agency.  Only the Sheriff’s Department (and no other City agency) also got hit by the state budget – with $500,000 from an extra day of monthly furloughs.  Cuts in the state prison system will also mean the Sheriff has to absorb more inmates at the County Jail – but we don’t know yet how much more that will cost.

These cuts are hitting departments that have already been ravaged.  When Mayor Gavin Newsom submitted his City budget proposal in June, it was the first time in recent history that more local General Fund dollars would go to Police than to Public Health, and more to the Fire Department than Human Services.  He cut $24 million out of Human Services, and $97 million from Public Health.  (NOTE: While Newsom announced on June 1st that public health would only get a $43 million cut, Beyond Chron quickly disproved that claim.)

The Board of Supervisors did what they could to stop the bleeding.  During the “add-back” process, the Budget & Finance Committee managed to save $43.7 million in programs – work that now hangs in jeopardy, as the Mayor makes mid-year cuts to find $18.4 million.  All the DPH-funded programs that the Board restored only totaled $12.5 million – or less than what the state is now cutting in public health funds.  Human Services “add-backs” totaled $4.1 million – or a quarter of what the state is now slashing from that department.

When you break it down further, it gets scary.  The Budget Committee saved about one million dollars in cuts to AIDS housing, prevention and treatment.  Now, the state cut $4.6 million of the AIDS money we were counting on.  Eight million dollars in mental health and substance abuse funds were restored during the “add-back” process, but the state just cut $3 million.  The Board worked to preserve $1.28 million to keep homeless shelters open and provide other direct homeless services, but the state has now cut $2.8 million in TANF shelter funds.

Health and human services already suffered cuts at the local level.  Now with the state budget, we need to make cuts elsewhere.

Holding the Mayor Accountable

The “official” budget season is now over, and the Board of Supervisors don’t have much power to make appropriations like they did in June and July.  The Mayor can make unilateral mid-year cuts because projected revenues from the state are not there, and in the past he has not treated the Board like equal partners.  A Charter Amendment to remedy this inequity failed to get put on the November ballot, so for now this is the system the Supervisors are stuck with.

Budget Chair John Avalos, however, got Newsom to agree to a certain level of accountability – codified in the budget ordinance.  After the Controller completes his analysis of state budget cuts (this week’s report was only preliminary; expect a final report by September 14), the Mayor has 21 days to submit a plan for mid-year cuts to the Supervisors – in other words, submit a supplemental de-appropriation.  The cuts cannot take effect until 45 days later, giving the Supervisors time to review the plan and hold hearings.  In other words, no mid-year cuts can go into effect until two months after the Controller’s Report.

The Supervisors can approve the Mayor’s mid-year cut proposal, amend it or “do nothing.”  It’s not an ideal situation (after all, amending it would require a super-majority), but it will be a marked improvement over the last mid-year cuts.  Back then, Newsom never even submitted a proposal to the Board for formal approval.  And only because the Supervisors proposed their own mid-year cuts did we even have formal hearings.  This process will give activists breathing room to push for different budget solutions, and it’s time to come up with creative solutions now.

Police and Fire Departments Must “Share the Pain”

When the Supervisors negotiated the City budget in June, they secured some reductions in the Police and Fire Departments from what Mayor Newsom had initially proposed.  But compared with what other agencies have sustained, we still don’t have a real “share the pain” budget.

Five million dollars off the Police budget still gave them $9 million more than what they got last year, and a $6 million cut from the Fire Department still gives the bloated agency a two million dollar raise.  In contrast, Human Services took a $20 million hit in the budget and Public Health got even more – despite a historic level of “add-back” money that the Board managed to scrounge up.

Normally, demanding that these agencies “share the pain” can only be done during budget season — when the Supervisors still have some clout.  But this year, they can still make such demand — thanks to a last-minute maneuver at the July 21st Board meeting.

Before passing the budget, the Board voted to put $45 million of the City budget “on reserve.”  Sponsored by David Campos, the amendment (which is in the final document that the Mayor signed) requires Newsom to come back to the Supervisors before spending that money – which now gives them leverage if he makes cuts to health and human services.  Twelve million of the money in question is in the Police budget, and $6.5 million is in the Fire Department.  In other words, up to 18.5 million dollars in cuts could be made to the Police and Fire Departments because of this reserve.

During the budget season, Beyond Chron analyzed the Fire Department budget – and identified over eight million dollars the City could cut that sensibly targeted the top brass, without re-opening negotiations their union contracts.  Another six million dollars could be found if the union – like all other public employee unions – agree to a “give-back,” for a total of $15 million.  But the Supervisors only cut $6 million.  The Board  still controls another $6.5 million of their budget in “reserves,” and now is the time to ask for a few concessions.

The Police Department could also be cut, as the Supervisors still have $12 million of their budget on reserve.  But it will be trickier, because there are not as many superfluous “top brass” positions like in the Fire Department.  The Police budget has exploded in recent years due to a generous union contract Newsom negotiated in 2007, and most of the increased costs come from retirement.  We would need cops (and firefighters) to increase their contributions to their retirement fund, which could help generate savings for the City.  After all, they explicitly promised to do so when the voters gave them 90% pensions.

Could closure of state beaches sink coastal tourism?

(Penny Wise and Pound Foolish. Welcome to the Recession Era California that Will Drive Your Depression Era Relatives Crazy! – promoted by Brian Leubitz)

IT’S A NIGHTMARE that is likely playing over and over in the heads of tourism bureau directors in beach towns around California: how many visitor dollars will go away if Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger really shuts down our state parks?

In seaside getaways all along the coast, the lure of the ocean draws tourists and their money, but the parking lots and campgrounds at most state-run beaches will be padlocked in a year if the governor’s proposal to close more than 80 percent of our state park system is approved. This will save the state $143 million and will likely put businesses dependent on visitors to state parks under water.

According to the California Travel Industry Association, studies have shown that every $1 that funds the state park system returns $2.35 to the General Fund, largely through economic activity in communities surrounding state parks. This is an estimated $350 million.

Ventura Visitors and Convention Bureau Director Jim Luttjohann is finding the possible closures sort of surreal. “It’s so huge it’s almost unfathomable,” he said. He just returned from a state conference on tourism where the mood was very somber. Schwarzenegger, who was scheduled to attend, didn’t show up. Other pressing matters kept him elsewhere, his staff explained.

For beachfront hotel owners on state lands, the prospect of fenced-off dunes must seem ludicrous. Luttjohann pointed to one Ventura hotel’s positioning near San Buenaventura State Beach, one of those on the closure list.

“We would have a beachside hotel where guests couldn’t go to the beach.”

ACCORDING TO THE GOVERNOR’S PROPOSAL, in July of 2010, 223 of our 279 state parks will be fenced off and closed to the public. In Ventura County and neighboring areas that would mean the closure of the popular San Buenaventura State Beach, Carpinteria State Beach, Emma Wood State Beach, El Capitan State Beach, Gaviota State Park, Leo Carrillo State Park, Malibu Creek State Park, Malibu Lagoon State Beach, McGrath State Beach, Refugio State Beach, Point Mugu State Park and Will Rogers State Historical Park.

It will also close access to the majestic beauty of Big Basin Redwoods State Park in the Santa Cruz area and Anza-Borrego near San Diego, among many other treasured spots.

But closing a state park doesn’t necessarily mean people will stay out, Luttjohan pointed out. There will be issues of safety with no lifeguards available in beach areas, no public restroom facilities and no maintenance. Vagrants could easily set up camp and the area will quickly become blighted.

Closures will force more beachgoers to neighborhoods with beach access unaffected by the budget cuts, clogging beach lanes with parked cars.

BUT THERE IS A SOLUTION. It’s just not popular with the minority Republicans, who are against all new fees and taxes, even ones which could keep our state’s tourism industry from taking a huge hit. Today the Senate Republicans voted against this plan despite polling done last year showing 74 percent of respondents in favor.

A $15 surcharge on vehicle license fees has been proposed which would allow anyone with a California license plate free day-use to our parks. (For example, the $8 entrance fee to San Buenaventura State Beach in Ventura would be waived.) This would generate enough to keep all our state parks open with enough left over to pay off debt on past park bonds. But it needs a 2/3 vote by both houses of the legislature to pass.

Go visit a state park today while you can. Take a long walk on the beach or in the woods and ask yourself: is this something I want to live without? And how long do we let a stubborn minority ruin the state for the rest of us without offering any of their own solutions?

Marie Lakin is a community activist and writes the Making Waves blog for the Ventura County Star

Smart on Crime: Good for Public Safety, Good for Budgets

(I want to welcome SF’s District Attorney Kamala Harris. – promoted by Brian Leubitz)

States across our country are facing budget deficits. California is projected to begin next fiscal year with a deficit of nearly 25 billion dollars, equaling one fourth of the state’s entire general fund. Over 10 billion of that general fund supports corrections and law enforcement. In this fiscal crisis, there is no denying the facts: tough budget times are here for public safety agencies. As the District Attorney for the City and County of San Francisco, I am personally familiar with the difficult circumstances we face. Without a significant shift in local and state practices, we can predict that shrinking law enforcement and corrections funding will result in higher crime rates, less support for victims, and fewer offenders being held accountable. If ever there was a time to think outside the box and break with the failed approaches of the past, the time is now. We need to do something different.

In San Francisco, I have developed a smart on crime approach: we must be tough on serious and violent offenders while we get just as tough on the root causes of crime. In my office, we have raised felony conviction rates and sent more violent offenders to state prison, at the same time we have launched innovative, cost effective approaches to reduce recidivism, truancy, and childhood trauma. With a genuine investment in breaking cycles of crime, we can improve public safety at the same time that we save precious public resources.

EDIT by Brian: See the flip

Reentry: Why it Matters to Law Enforcement

Over the last thirty years, our prison population has soared. In 1980, California had a prison population of about 24,000 in a state of 24 million. Today we have an inmate population of 172,000 out of 36 million people. This means that since 1980, our population has grown by 50 % while our prison population has grown 617%.

Today, the majority of those inmates are not first-time offenders. Each year, approximately 70 percent of those released from California prisons commit another offense, resulting in the highest recidivism rate in the nation. These repeat offenses are preventable crimes that claim more victims and harm communities’ quality of life. It costs an estimated $10,000 to prosecute just one felony case, and about $47,000 per year to house just one inmate in prison. Every time an inmate is released and commits a new crime, local and state jurisdictions pay those costs over and over again.  To keep our communities safe and use public money wisely, we must ensure that people coming out of the criminal justice system become productive citizens and stay out.

Four years ago my office pioneered a model reentry initiative called "Back on Track" to reduce recidivism among nonviolent offenders. Back on Track combines accountability with opportunity to ensure that first-time nonviolent drug offenders are held accountable, stop committing crime and become self-sufficient. In Back on Track, offenders plead guilty and commit to strict court supervision as they complete an intensive personal responsibility program. They get trained for a job, go back to school, get current with child support, enroll in parenting classes, and become positive contributors in their communities. The program encompasses swift sanctions for making bad choices and clear incentives for good ones. As a result, less than 10 percent of Back on Track graduates have re-offended compared to a 54 percent recidivism rate statewide for the same population of offenders. We have achieved this success at a fraction of the cost of traditional corrections approaches. Back on Track costs about $5,000 annually per participant, compared to $35,000 to 47,000 for jail or prison.

To graduate, Back on Track participants must be employed or in school. The program has been selected as a national model by the National District Attorney’s Association and at least two jurisdictions have replicated the initiative. Back on Track demonstrates that preventing recidivism is both viable and cost-effective.

Truancy: Keeping Children in School Means Keeping Our Streets Safe

In 2007, after another year of high homicide rates in San Francisco, I asked my staff to review the victims’ histories to assess trends. We found that over the prior four years, 94% of homicide victims under the age of 25 were high school drop outs. We then reviewed SF public schools data and found that over 5,000 students were habitually or chronically truant each year, and nearly half of those kids were in elementary school. These are the kids on route to becoming high school drop outs.

In response, I joined with the San Francisco Unified School District to launch a citywide truancy initiative focused on getting elementary and middle school kids back in school. As the city’s chief prosecutor, I sent every parent in the district a letter explaining that I was prepared to prosecute parents if they broke the law by keeping their children out of school. I was surprised to discover that many parents didn’t know that California law makes education mandatory for children under the age of 18. Thousands of parents attended informational meetings on truancy after receiving the letter, and we fielded hundreds of calls from parents who had questions or needed help.

We also held face-to-face "D.A. Mediation" meetings with over 2,000 parents. Suddenly, the principals didn’t need to work so hard to convince parents to take seriously the consequences of keeping their child from school because a prosecutor was in the room. Through these mediations, we met parents in need of help to get their kids in school. One mother of three, for example, was homeless and holding down two jobs. We connected her to services so she could do what she wanted to do – be a good mother and put her children in school.

Mediations resulted in significant progress for most of the parents. Still, some continued to fail. In these cases, my office filed criminal charges. The children of these parents, some as young as six years old, had missed as many as 80 days of school out of a 180 day school year. Once we filed criminal charges, things started to change. Those parents report to a Truancy Court that combines consequences and support services to make sure that parents get their children in school.

Since we started this initiative, truancy rates for elementary school kids in San Francisco have dropped by 23 percent. And it did not take millions of dollars, bureaucratic red tape, or a decade to see results. It only took genuine commitment and a willingness to shake up the status quo.

What starts out as chronic truancy makes a child far more likely to end up dropping out of school, becoming a victim, or getting arrested. Taking swift corrective action now will reduce the likelihood of harmful and costly consequences later.

Childhood Trauma: Breaking the Silence to Help Children and Youth  

Last year in San Francisco, a teenage boy was gunned down while waiting outside a school for a ride. His senseless murder was witnessed by dozens of young students who were outside at the time. Months later, many of these youth had not accessed mental health support to recover from what they saw. Worse still, for some, it was likely not the first time they had witnessed violence. Some young people come from homes where violence is the norm, while others see violence in their neighborhoods far too frequently. The impact of repeated exposure to violence on children is enormous: they can’t concentrate in school, they’re detached, or they act-up and misbehave.

Like soldiers at war, children are highly likely to suffer from trauma from repeated exposure to violence. And like soldiers coming home, they often suffer from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). Unfortunately, many of these children go undiagnosed or are misdiagnosed and thereby not treated appropriately. Worse still, children repeatedly traumatized by violence at an early age are more likely to fall through the cracks and become either victims or perpetrators of violence later in life.

Studies have shown that up to 35 percent of children and youth exposed to community violence develop PTSD. Exposure to community violence affects everything from a child’s sleep, to their school success, to the physical development of their brains.

In the District Attorney’s Office, we often see the needs of children from distressed families or neighborhoods go untreated. To address these unmet needs, last year we joined with California State Senator Mark Leno to craft ground-breaking legislation to provide funding for mental health counseling for traumatized children and youth. Signed into law last year, our bill allows children who witness community violence to access up to $5,000 for therapy and mental health support.

When we look at children growing up in tough environments, we need to see them through a prism instead of a plate glass window. Left unaddressed, their complex and difficult surroundings can overwhelm their minds and harm their chances for future success. If we can recognize their needs and get timely help, we can substantially increase life prospects for these children before it’s too late.

What Needs to Happen Can Happen

These are just a few examples of what can be done to improve public safety and break the cycle of crime. Being smart on crime requires changing our thinking. Albert Einstein once said, "The significant problems we face cannot be solved at the same level of thinking we were at when we created them." The State of California is at an economic crossroads that demands new approaches. I am confident that we can meet that demand through a long-term strategy of responsive, preventative and evidence-based "smart on crime" approaches, thereby ensuring a better and safer future for all of us.

This post was initially published at ACSblog: http://www.acslaw.org/node/13582

CA 10–Sign the Petition-“No on Props 1A-1F” on May 19th

If there’s one thing I learned from my leadership training at West Point and my service in Iraq, it’s that you can’t hide from your problems. Challenges must be met head-on -and with a true understanding of the costs and the consequences of your actions.

It is precisely this lesson that informs my decision to implore my friends, family, supporters and all Californians to vote NO on Propositions 1A-1F.

Make Your Voice Heard–Sign Our Petition

California’s budget is a mess – year in and year out, our leaders in Sacramento have been unable to pass a balanced budget on time. Because of it, our state is being bankrupted, teachers are being laid off and funds are being taken away from our kids and our most vulnerable, including returning veterans.

We don’t need more stopgap measures and backroom political deals to solve this problem – real budget reform will require a comprehensive approach and a wide-ranging set of real, substantive solutions to set us back on the right course.

Right now special interests like Chevron, and other corporations that benefit from the midnight deals cut in Sacramento, are spending millions of dollars on slick media campaigns in a desperate attempt to scare voters into accepting a bad solution.

It’s up to us to remind the Sacramento politicians that they work for us.

That’s why I have set up a people’s petition on my web site, opposing each of these flawed measures and calling on our state’s elected leaders to get back to work and create a real budget solution based on sound principles, not backroom politics.

CLICK HERE TO SIGN THE PETITION NOW

Propositions 1A-1F won’t solve California’s problems because they don’t address the most fundamental problems with our state budget-a broken process, a failure to set clear priorities, and retreating from tough choices.  At best, they are temporary fixes – classic “Sacramento Solutions,” crafted in the middle of the night for political purposes.

Now, the same Sacramento politicians that created this mess are “spinning” their backroom deals as real solutions that will help solve our budget crisis and protect our most important services.

In Sacramento, political “spin” is just about all we see these days. Propositions 1A-1F are a classic example of politicians calling what is clearly a defeat, a victory.  

On the battlefield there is no “spin.” You are successful or you are defeated. And the consequences of defeat are very real.

If eight years of George Bush, a global financial meltdown, a worsening healthcare crisis, and $4.00/gallon gasoline have taught us anything, it’s that the longer we wait to address our problems head on, the more expensive and more complicated those problems become.  

California truly can’t afford more temporary political fixes and we surely can’t hide from our problems.

I hope you’ll join me in voting NO on Propositions 1A-1F – and I hope you’ll work with me in demanding California’s elected leaders get back to work, and craft real, lasting solutions to California’s budget crisis.

Anthony Woods

Democrat for Congress, CA 10

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