California financial crisis - Time for a new system?

[Magda Hassan]

Looking very grim in this part of the world. A total lack of imagination about any real fixes. Sick women and poor children first to be thrown off life raft. What a pathetic response.






Billions in new cuts loom for California — including eliminating welfare and closing most state parks

By Karen de Sá

Mercury News

Posted: 05/26/2009 07:19:35 PM PDT
Updated: 05/27/2009 08:59:42 AM PDT


Facing a growing state budget deficit, that could reach nearly $24 billion,... ( Rich Pedroncelli )

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• News, resources as California battles another fiscal mess
  

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Faced with a ballooning deficit and a clear signal that voters won't pay more to fix it, California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger released a budget plan Tuesday that would eliminate welfare, drop 1 million poor children from health insurance, cut off new grants for college students and shut down 80 percent of state parks.
In a state that long has prided itself on its social safety net, it could well go down in history as the most drastic reduction in social programs ever. And billions in further cuts will be unveiled later this week.
The governor's proposal to whack an additional $5.5 billion from state programs stunned even longtime Capitol-watchers with its blunt force. Ending cash assistance for 1.3 million impoverished state residents, for example, would make California the only state with no welfare program.
"Every single first-world nation has a safety net program for children," said Will Lightbourne, Santa Clara County's social services director. "This would return us to the era of Dickens — you'd have to go back to the 19th century to find a comparable proposal."
The governor's office reiterated that the cuts were painful but unavoidable, with the proposed budget for the 2009-10 fiscal year already outdated before lawmakers even begin debate. Schwarzenegger's finance team now says the deficit will grow to $24.3 billion by July 1, up from the previous $21.3 billion projected shortfall.
"The scope and the severity of

this recession have forced us to put options on the table that would have been unthinkable just a few short months ago," said H.D. Palmer, the state's deputy director of finance.Schwarzenegger had warned before last week's special election that if voters did not approve a host of tax and budget-reform measures, stunning cuts to social services, education and other vital state programs would be necessary.
The deepest cuts
So, in the wake of the resounding "no" that came from a disillusioned electorate, he has held true to his promise and then some:
The budget proposal would eliminate vast swaths of programs, including CalWORKs — the welfare program serving more than 521,000 families who now receive $526 average monthly grants — and Healthy Families, which subsidizes health care for low-income children whose families don't qualify for Medi-Cal. Those cuts would also cost the state billions in federal matching funds.
Medi-Cal coverage for dialysis and for breast and cervical cancer treatment for those over age 65 would be cut. Undocumented immigrants would lose nonemergency health care.
In the prisons, rehabilitation, education and vocational programs would be hacked. So would the sentences of nonviolent, non-serious offenders, who would go free a year early.
More than 200,000 college-bound students would lose some or all of their tuition assistance under the Cal Grant program. New grants for students to attend college would be eliminated, and existing grants would be reduced. All of that would come on top of $335 million in cuts for the University of California and California State University systems — which already have seen $415 million in cuts this year, forcing student fee increases.
Surprisingly spared the ax — so far, anyway — were the state's battered K-12 schools. Though they represent California's single biggest budget

expense, the governor proposed no new cuts Tuesday.Political stunt?
But the depth of the proposal had some analysts calling it a political stunt to jar bickering legislators, and still others saying nothing would surprise them in these recessionary times of record unemployment.
Lauren Asher, acting president of the nonprofit Institute for College Access & Success in Berkeley, said eliminating tens of millions in financial aid would reduce students' tuition assistance by up to $9,708 apiece. At least 118,000 students would lose their entire grants, she said, adding that "the proposed cuts will wreak havoc with college plans for this fall."
The governor's budget also proposes massive and historic cuts to California's system of 279 state parks, from Big Basin Redwoods in the Santa Cruz Mountains to the Malibu beaches. Schwarzenegger has proposed cutting general fund money to parks in half this year and eliminating it entirely next year — cuts on a scale that have never been imposed on the state parks system since it began in earnest in the 1920s.
"Absolutely, we will have to close parks. The question is how many," said Roy Stearns, a spokesman for the state parks department in Sacramento.
While Schwarzenegger and Republican legislators have made clear new taxes or fees are off the table, Assembly budget committee Chairwoman Noreen Evans — embodying Democratic reaction to the Republican governor's proposal — vowed to push for new revenue measures such as taxes on soda or oil production as alternatives to more spending cuts.
"I will look under every rock and every leaf," the Santa Rosa Democrat said, "so that we can make sure women and children are fed and their medical needs are taken care of."