Once again, a judge has invalidated parts of a “tough on crime” ballot initiative.  Earlier it was Jessica’s Law, Prop. 83, which was ruled partially unconstitutional.  Now Prop. 9, passed last year, has been found to have illegal provisions.

A key part of a victims’ rights measure voters approved in November was blocked Thursday by a federal judge, who ruled that the state cannot restrict parole violators’ right to state-provided legal counsel when considering whether to send them back to prison.

Senior Judge Lawrence K. Karlton of the U.S. District Court in Sacramento ruled against Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and the state in issuing an injunction against part of Proposition 9, the measure known as the Victims’ Bill of Rights Act of 2008: Marsy’s Law.

The initiative dictates that the state provide legal counsel to parole violators only under certain circumstances, including when the case is unusually complex or when the parolee is indigent or has issues of mental competency.

The SacBee has more.  I don’t know how this could ever have even reached the ballot in the first place.  And this is part of our insane parole policy, which even before this law was failing the state.  67% of all inmates sent to prison in 2007 were parole violators, often for technical violations.  As I wrote then:

It is a financial and moral disaster that we are throwing men and women back in jail for parole violations at such an accelerated rate, far beyond any other state in the country.  This is clearly a factor of the state’s parole policy, which is too constrictive and too quick to return people to prison.  It surely leads to the high recidivism rate for those who commit crimes multiple times – if they feel they can’t escape the system once they’re in it, they simply have no incentive to rehabilitate themselves […]

We are diseased by the prison-industrial complex.  Prison construction is good for the CCPOA and supposedly good for the economy but it’s based on a flawed notion that all construction spending is valuable.  In fact, prison construction, especially of the type so needless that bringing parole policy in line with the other 49 states in the union would practically eliminate the overcrowding crisis and rendering the need for more beds moot, crowds out other, more valuable building projects that have a tangible value to people’s lives.  We are violating the human rights of inmates and the Constitutional provision against cruel and unusual punishment, as well as stifling innovative public investment, because the parole officers have a powerful lobby and the Tough on Crime dementia has infested the minds of practically every legislator in the state for 30 years.

At the national level, we are finally seeing the seeds of a robust prison reform movement.  Jim Webb and Arlen Specter have submitted a bill to completely overhaul the criminal justice system.  The bill would commission a panel to review incarceration rates, sentencing policies, gang violence, prison administration and reintegration of offenders.  This sounds like a small step, but considering that absolutely nothing has been done to stop the train of “tough on crime” insanity from rolling down the track in decades, it’s significant.  A copy of the legislation is here.  Sen. Webb remarked:

“America’s criminal justice system has deteriorated to the point that it is a national disgrace,” said Senator Webb. “With five percent of the world’s population, our country houses twenty-five percent of the world’s prison population. Incarcerated drug offenders have soared 1200% since 1980. And four times as many mentally ill people are in prisons than in mental health hospitals. We should be devoting precious law enforcement capabilities toward making our communities safer. Our neighborhoods are at risk from gang violence, including transnational gang violence […]

“We are not protecting our citizens from the increasing danger of criminals who perpetrate violence and intimidation as a way of life, and we are locking up too many people who do not belong in jail,” concluded Webb. “I believe that American ingenuity can discover better ways to deal with the problems of drugs and nonviolent criminal behavior while still minimizing violent crime and large-scale gang activity.

The bill has 14 co-sponsors, neither or whom are named Boxer or Feinstein.  Tell them they should know better, with the prison crisis consuming more and more of the state budget and destroying the lives of nonviolent offenders.

A couple quick updates to stories we’ve been following:

• The State Senate today approved two bills relating to unemployment insurance on a near-unanimous vote.  The bill  (AB 23×3) to extend benefits for an additional 20 weeks using federal stimulus money passed 38-0, and the bill (AB 29×3) changing eligibility requirements to allow seasonal workers to benefit from unemployment benefits, also with federal money, passed 37-1.  The latter bill needs to go to the Assembly for concurrence; the former will go right to the Governor.  Sen. Gil Cedillo remarked in his release:

“Our immediate action on this issue was necessary to help almost half a million unemployed Californians stay afloat. These bills put to use the estimated $3 billion dollars in federal stimulus monies made available by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA),” remarked Cedillo. “We have a tremendous opportunity to turn our economy around and put federal dollars to work for California. The bipartisan leadership today highlights what we are able to accomplish when we focus on results,” Cedillo added.

At least 76,000 people whose benefits would run out on April 11 would see immediate relief.  It appears the Governor, after hedging, will sign both bills, but we shall see.

• As early as tomorrow, says Marty Omoto, we may have a decision from the Finance Director Mike Genest and Treasurer Bill Lockyer on whether the state will receive enough stimulus funding to “pull the trigger” that would reduce some of the worst cuts in February’s budget, and eliminate some of the tax increases.

The determination by the State Treasurer and Department of Finance Director is crucial on whether major permanent cuts happen or not to several critical programs that serve hundreds of thousands of people with disabilities, mental health needs, the blind, seniors and low income families. While there has been no official word on what the State Treasurer or the Finance Director will report, most observers feel that the likely news will not be good.

If you want the details on the cuts at risk, read Marty’s post.  Given the fact that the Legislative Analyst already foresees an $8 billion dollar hole in the budget, and that the special election poll numbers are tanking, which would add another $5-$6 billion hole, I would expect the bad news as well.  Because of the murkiness of what money counts toward the General Fund and what doesn’t, there’s a fair bit of room for politicking in there.

I think the state legislature and the Governor might want to try the tactic of opposing the May 19 ballot initiatives, because apparently, anything they support, the public does the opposite.

When read the full text of the ballot measures, likely voters express these preferences:

Proposition 1A: About four in 10 support the measure (39% yes, 46% no, 15% undecided) to change the

budget process by increasing the state “rainy day” fund. Less than half say the measure would be very (7%)

or somewhat (38%) effective in helping California avoid future state budget deficits.

Proposition 1B: They are divided (44% yes, 41% no, 15% undecided) on the initiative that would require future

supplemental payments to local school districts and community colleges to address recent budget cuts.

Proposition 1C: Half oppose (37% yes, 50% no, 11% undecided) the measure to modernize the lottery and

allow for $5 billion in borrowing from future lottery profits to help balance next year’s state budget.

Proposition 1D: Nearly half support (48% yes, 36% no, 16% undecided) the proposition to temporarily transfer

funds from early childhood education to help balance the state budget.

Proposition 1E: Nearly half favor (47% yes, 37% no, 16% undecided) the measure to transfer money from

mental health services to the general fund to help balance the state budget.

Proposition 1F: An overwhelming majority (81% yes, 13% no, 6% undecided) support the initiative that would

block pay increases to state elected officials in years of budget deficit.

Keep in mind that the first poll, taken about a month ago, showed all six measures passing by a fairly decent margin.  And there has been no coordinated opposition.  So what changed?  I’d gather the confidence in the legislature and the Governor has completely collapsed:

Eight weeks before the special election-called as part of the 2009-2010 budget agreement between the governor and legislature-those Californians most likely to go to the polls are feeling grim about the state of their state: The vast majority (77%) say it is headed in the wrong direction and see its fiscal situation as a big problem (85%). They give record low ratings to the legislature (11%) and to their own legislators (29%). Their approval rating for Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger (33%) has dropped to a new low among likely voters. For the first time, a majority of Republican likely voters (54%) disapprove of the job performance of the Republican governor.

The results are striking when compared to rising approval ratings for Congress and California’s senators and to  

a strongly positive view of President Obama-despite a challenging economic climate.  

“Californians are clear that the budget situation is serious, but most disapprove of the leadership in

Sacramento-the people who are providing the solutions,” says Mark Baldassare, PPIC president, CEO, and

survey director. “These leaders have their work cut out for them if they want to persuade voters that the ballot

measures are necessary to address the problem.”

If you want to know why the Governor had to explain that he’s not running for future office, that would be because nobody likes him.  And the legislature, obviously, is even worse – the 29% rating for people’s local legislator is absurdly low and quite dangerous.  In a normal world, that would spell lots of primary challenges.

Let me stress that this election is not over – the opposition still isn’t well-funded, and the CTA just put $2 million into Prop. 1B.  The Governor has already started funding the other measures.  With an unbalanced funding war, these measures could bounce back.  But the rule of thumb is that measures in this position right now lose.  I see 1A in particular in the situation of the mountain climber from The Price Is Right, with just a little opposition sufficient to send him over the cliff.

For several months, I have noticed a lack of context from the press when discussing California’s housing situation.  Sales of new and existing homes were rising, yes, but for a very good reason – all the bargains created by a spate of foreclosures.  In fact, the correlation matches up perfectly – the regions with the highest sales also have the lowest prices.  An example is the High Desert region, with a 203.1% increase in sales year-over-year, but a median price of $121,970, the lowest in the state.    The latest data on home sales shows a 41% decline in price year-over-year.  Bloomberg’s story reinforces the theory that only foreclosures are selling.  Does this mean that property values have decreased by a concurrent amount?  Not necessarily.  But it does mean that a non-foreclosed home in this distressed market has virtually no chance of selling, making it impossible to find the bottom of the market.  The price of foreclosures does affect the price of all homes, which is why stopping foreclosures is so important.

But that effort will be stymied by the continued erosion of the job market, leading to more unemployed and more people losing their homes.

California unemployment will peak at just over 12 percent late this year, setting a modern record, according to the latest forecast from the University of the Pacific.

Recovery will come slowly. Unemployment won’t sink back into single digits until late 2011, or some two years after the recession is expected to officially end, according to a forecast released Tuesday by UOP.

There’s typically a considerable lag between the beginning of an economic recovery and a drop in the unemployment rate, as companies are slow to re-hire even after business perks up.

We’re talking about two more years, at least, of significantly reduced revenue collection rates.  All the homes selling for pennies reduce the overall property tax revenue.  No projection of future revenues can reasonably be believed in this environment.  And so we’ll continue to see yawning gaps, with a governmental structure woefully equipped to deal with them.  The so-called “reform” of Prop. 1A, to hoard revenue in positive economic years to use in down years, will be inoperative for the foreseeable future, and even when the economy retains balance, the revenue forecasts for any spending cap will be increasingly based on these horrible years, leading to a disaster without end.

In years when revenues fall short, the state could use the reserve to cover spending up to the prior year’s level, plus an adjustment for growth in population and the Consumer Price Index.

But increases in the state’s senior population and health care costs have been outpacing both those measures, said Jean Ross, executive director of the California Budget Project, a nonprofit organization that focuses on the effect of budget policies on low-and middle-income Californians.

Moreover, Ross noted that under Proposition 58, the 2004 ballot measure, the state will continue to send 3 percent of revenues to the reserve, which would be subject to the tighter controls of Proposition 1A.

“It takes 3 percent off the top of the budget, and we don’t have that,” Ross said.

Ross and Michael Cohen, a deputy legislative analyst who studied the measure in depth, both said Proposition 1A could force revenue into the reserve even in years in which the state faced deficits.

My guess is that this is why the AFSCME local 2620 voted to support the measure and others on the ballot, while the overall union called for rejection.  The lure of easy money might sound nice for the locals, but unions with experience with spending caps in other states know that they accompany disaster.

Simply put, the state’s in an enormous amount of trouble and has no structures to deal with it.  This argues strongly for blowing up the boxes, for real this time, and starting over, by repealing the rules that subject the budget to tyranny and building a new vehicle for reform.

John Myers reports that US District Judge Thelton Henderson just ordered up a big glass of STFU for Arnold Schwarzenegger and Jerry Brown.

The federal judge who took control of California prison health care some three years ago rejected a request today to scrap the court-appointed receivership.

U.S. District Judge Thelton Henderson denied a petition from Governor Schwarzenegger and Attorney General Jerry Brown to replace the receivership with the more limited powers of a special master.

The 24-page ruling from Henderson is probably best summarized by the following passage:

“Based on the entire record in this case, the Court is far from confident that Defendants [the state] have the will, capacity, or leadership to provide constitutionally adequate medical care in the absence of a receivership, and Defendants have presented no evidence to the contrary.”

Schwarzenegger, Brown, and the entire political establishment in Sacramento have had plenty of chances to show their commitment to solving the prison crisis over the past 30 years, and they have miserably, utterly failed.  They want to hide from those failures because they don’t want to pay to meet their obligations to prisoners under the US Constitution.  And of course, the Administration plans to appeal the ruling, because they can’t admit their own failure.

Good to see that Henderson didn’t fall for the coordinated swiftboating of Clark Kelso.  Maybe now we can talk about cost-effective reforms that make sense instead of a fealty to “tough on crime” logic and a shrinking from obligations as a public servant.

(By the way, I highly recommend Adam Serwer’s article about prison reform, citing Kansas as a case study in how to drive down recidivism, provide economic opportunity for those coming out of the corrections system and save money all at once.)

I’m thoroughly unsurprised that Steve Poizner has joined Meg Whitman in an effort to out-anti-tax one another through opposition to Prop. 1A.

Specifically, the politicians don’t want you to know all the facts when it comes to Proposition 1A.  This is the ballot measure that would impose a state constitutional spending limit – a concept that is supported by an overwhelming majority of Californians.

However, if the measure passes, it will also extend the huge tax increases recently approved by the legislature. Passage of Proposition 1A means that the near-doubling of the car tax, the 1 cent statewide sales tax increase, the income tax hike and the reduction in the dependent tax credit would continue for an additional two years.  That adds up to an estimated $16 billion in higher taxes.  It’s no surprise these taxes are not supported by the majority of Californians.

That’s why our state legislators want to keep the truth from you about Proposition 1A and they’ve stacked the deck in their favor.  So when you read the official ballot description of the measure – what should be an objective description on what is being voted on – you will see no mention of the taxes.  The legislative leadership wrote the ballot description themselves and intentionally omitted any reference to the tax increase extension.  They made sure what you read is biased.

The Yacht Party has been so consumed with tax ideology, as if the only role of government is to decide what not to tax, that they fail to see the spending cap forest through the trees.  Which is fine with me, because as Anthony Wright notes, this cap would painfully ratchet down services and make any economic revival in California extremely difficult.

The revenue forecast amount established by Proposition 1A, which limits spending from the state’s existing tax base, would be significantly below the Governor’s “baseline” spending forecast, a forecast that assumes that the cuts proposed by the Governor in his New Year’s Eve budget release continue. For example, in 2010-11, the first year when the Director of Finance would be required to calculate whether the state has received “unanticipated revenues,” the revenue cap would be an estimated $16 billion lower than the Governor’s “baseline” spending estimate for the same year. The gap would widen in 2011-12 and 2012-13 to $17 billion and $21 billion, respectively.

By basing the new cap on a level of revenues that is insufficient to pay for the current level of programs and services, Proposition 1A would limit the state’s ability to restore reductions made during the current downturn out of existing revenues […]

Proposition 1A limits the amount that can be used from the reserve in “bad budget” years to the difference between anticipated revenues and prior year’s spending adjusted for population growth and the CPI. It does not allow the reserve to be used to support a “current services” or “baseline” budget, even if sufficient funds would be available in the reserve to do so. The discrepancy arises from the fact that the CPI – the inflation measure used by Proposition 1A – is designed to measure changes in the cost of goods purchased by households, not governments.

Thus, the CPI does not accurately measure the year-to-year increase in the cost of delivering the same level of public services. Specifically, the CPI does not take into account the fact that government spends a larger share of its budget on items – such as health care – for which costs have risen faster than the rate of inflation. Between 1990 and 2007, for example, national per capita health care expenditures more than doubled, rising by 164 percent, while the CPI for California, which measures inflation in households’ purchases, rose by just 61 percent.

The particular concern for health care is noteworthy. If the formulas in Prop 1A don’t take into account medical inflation, an aging population, or other impacts–like the erosion of employer-based health coverage–then existing health programs are threatened.

Read the whole thing.  These are the guts of this awful deal, what you won’t hear when you call your legislator and they use buzzwords like “rainy day fund.”  At a time when the health care system in California frays at the edges, this spending cap would ultimately stop any progressive reform on anything that costs money, bottom line.  The executive under 1A gets all kinds of new powers to make cuts, and absolutely none to raise revenues.  It’s Prop. 13 on steroids.  That’s why the Governor likes it so much.

But 1A has been structured to sidestep vigorous opposition through a series of bribes, particularly to the teacher’s union.  Prop. 1B, which would repay $9.3 billion dollars to schools starting in 2011-2012 can only pass if Prop. 1A passes.  This has led the CTA to support all six budget measures on the May ballot, severing the united front that labor used to beat Arnold’s special election measures in 2005.  Interestingly, the California Federation of Teachers (CFT) will only support Prop. 1B, and in a pique of schizophrenia, denounced 1A as a “power grab” by the Governor.

Of course, the CFT is substantially smaller than CTA.  And while the California Nurses Association’s opposition to the whole special election ballot is noble and appreciated, ultimately some of the stakeholders with money will need to enter the arena.  We leave a shameful legacy to the children of this state if the spending cap passes.

(Assembly Bill 23xxx, the employment benefits extension bill, passed the Assembly. I added the Speaker’s video discussing it. – promoted by Brian Leubitz)

There are two bills likely to come up for vote this week that would allow California to receive billions in stimulus funding, both of which have been subject to Yacht Party obstruction thus far of the Mark Sanford, Sarah Palin variety.

First up is the unemployment benefits extension bill which Republicans rejected last week.  There are actually two separate measures, one which would extend benefits and one which would increase the pool of people eligible for those benefits, but the extension is the one that will be voted on as soon as today.  Kudos to the SacBee for noting that the Governor has taken no position on these bills, despite the bromance rhetoric about the President and the stimulus.

The Assembly is expected to vote this week, probably today, on a bill that would pave the way for California to extend its lifeline for out-of-work residents by five months at federal expense.

The measure would ensure an extra $2.5 billion to $3 billion in federal funds for emergency benefits at a time when California is mired in recession, with an unemployment rate above 10 percent.

Passage would mean $6,140 in additional benefits for an out-of-work person receiving the state’s average benefit of $307 per week. Benefits range from $65 to $475, based on previous income earned […]

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger supports both concepts but has not taken a position on specific legislation, aides said.

Schwarzenegger has “no position” because the Chamber of Commerce doesn’t like anything that could lead to higher corporate taxes, and they hold the puppet strings on our last action hero.  The vote on this has yet to be recorded in the Assembly, so we shall see what the Yacht Party decides.

The second bill, currently in the State Senate, concerns Medi-Cal eligibility requirements that would open up even more federal funding.

Although California is slated to receive more than $31 billion in federal money, a change in eligibility rules for Medi-Cal made as part of this year’s budget prevents California from qualifying for more than 25 percent of those  federal funds.

In order to do so, the state must have the same Medi-Cal eligibility rules today as those in place July 1, 2008.

The problem was caused by an attempt to save $70 million by changing eligibility rules for children receiving care from Medi-Cal was contained in the 85-day record late budget signed by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger last September.

Under the change, children must fill out a report every six months confirming their continuing eligibility along with their parents who were already required to fill out such a report prior to the change in law.

Critics of the requirement say that most of the children who lose eligibility do so because they forget to turn in the paperwork, not because they actually lose eligibility. Sorting out such issues increases Medi-Cal costs to counties, who administer the program locally.

To get the federal money, the state must change the law before July 1, 2009 so that kids don’t need to fill out the report. The bill would do that.

Let’s be entirely clear – the Administration was banking on oversights from poor families who qualify for Medi-Cal to save the state money.  That’s borderline immoral and it ought to be addressed.  Elaine Alquist is carrying the bill in the Senate, and on this one, Schwarzenegger has seen the error of his ways and promises to sign it.  Will the Yacht Party follow suit, or prefer budgeting by forcing bureaucratic red tape on the poor?