CALIFORNIA Gov. Jerry Brown on Wednesday, June 24, signed a $115.4 billion general fund budget package containing initiatives aimed at providing relief to the poor while holding back on funding for certain social programs.
Among provisions of the budget include $68.4 billion for public schools and community colleges, up from $66.3 billion last year. It also provides $40 million to expand Medical coverage to cover low-income undocumented immigrants. The new budget further establishes an earned income tax credit for working-poor families.
California will also implement an amnesty program for residents who are unable to pay skyrocketing court fines and traffic penalties that have led to 4.8 million driver’s license suspensions since 2006.
Despite improvements in the state economy, Brown, a fiscally moderate Democrat, successfully urged lawmakers to refrain from spending. The governor argued that California’s cyclical economy is prone to sharp and often unanticipated drops and the compromise reached was based on a lower projection for state revenues.
“This is a sound, well thought-out budget,” Brown said. “Yet, the work never ends and in the coming months we’ll have to manage our resources with the utmost prudence.”
Including special and bond funds, the budget totals $167.6 billion.
The budget contains six line-item vetoes totaling $1.3 million. The amount was the lowest for a California budget since 1982, when Brown was previously governor and vetoed nothing.
Of these vetoes includes the elimination of $1 million toward restoration efforts in Clear Lake in Lake County. Brown said there are grants available to support the project and directed his administration to help Lake County officials identify them.
Brown also vetoed funding language authorizing the Department of Finance to approve as much as $15 million to relinquish Tower Bridge to Sacramento and West Sacramento.
Despite approval of the budget, the Legislature is still left with financial decisions to make. Brown has called for two special sessions to determine new sources to fund healthcare programs, given changes in federal law, and to address how California will pay for its transportation infrastructure.
Additionally, Brown and legislative leaders were not able to come to an agreement on how to spend hundreds of millions of dollars in cap-and-trade revenue, which is paid to offset carbon emissions.
Michael Cohen, Brown’s finance director, said on Wednesday that the administration does not support using these revenues for road repairs. He further spoke against tacking on a special fee on electric vehicles, as some states have done to compensate for lost gasoline taxes.
Cohen said the state has “spent a lot of money encouraging the purchase of electric cars, so calling them out and having electric cars pay an additional fee runs counter to all of the money that we’ve spent encouraging the purchase of them.”
The budget plan puts approximately $2 billion into California’s rainy day fund and pays down more than $7 million in debt, and elicited mixed reactions from state Republican lawmakers. Some worry California still carries too much debt, especially for public employee pensions and their retirement benefits, the Associated Press reported.
“I remain concerned that the record high spending levels will not be sustainable in the near future, and I disagree with some of the priorities in this budget plan,” said Senate Minority Leader Bob Huff (R-San Dimas), according to the news agency.
Brown announced the signing on Twitter with a brief message accompanied by a photo of himself with Democratic leaders Assembly Speaker Toni Atkins of San Diego and Senate President Pro Tem Kevin de Leon of Los Angeles. (With reports from Reuters, The Associated Press and The Sacramento Bee)
(www.asianjournal.com)
(LA Weekend June 27 – 30, 2015 Sec A pg.9)
