Let’s just call a spade a spade. Our budget has walls. Lots of them. And when you try to bust through one wall, you are going find some very angry villagers behind the next one.

That’s what happened with the redevelopment agencies. They had some money sitting around behind their walls, and the folks up in Sacramento took notice. So, off the money goes to the schools.

State officials dodged a $2-billion bullet Tuesday when a judge ruled that last year’s shift of funds away from redevelopment agencies to pay for schools was legal.

In a 26-page ruling, Sacramento County Superior Court Judge Lloyd Connelly said the state was within its rights to move the money. The maneuver saves more than $1.7 billion in the current budget year and $350 million for the 2010-2011 budget year.

Legislators have been trying to borrow from and shift various pots of money as part of their continuing effort to balance the state’s books, which are more than $18 billion out of whack. The moves have prompted lawsuits, some of which have ended in rulings that the state acted illegally.

Connelly said payments to schools “benefit redevelopment” and therefore are a valid use of redevelopment funds. (LA Times)

This is the problem that we have with a budget that is chock full of walls and lacks flexibility.  We can’t look at our overall priorities, we have to peek at one area or another.

In the end, the money is probably better off with the schools, but that doesn’t change the greater point that we just can’t continue to deal with a budget this large without taking a broader view.