So FR readers know that a judge ruled against State Controller John "Union Tool" Chiang and so Governor Schwarzenegger’s modest proposal to require all state employees to take off two days a month without pay (now referred to as "Furlough Fridays" apparently). My prediction is that this action foreshadows more extreme decisions by the Governor, such as significant layoffs. Logically, how do you shrink state expenditures down to the level of state income without reducing the state’s work force? I digress…
So all of the State’s Constitution Officers who are not famous movie stars all send whiny letters to Chiang, who packages them all up (see the attachment below) and puts a cover letter on them, and asks Judge Marlette to, in essence, exempt these 15,000 or so state civil servants from the furloughs that effects over 200,000 other state employees. (I would note, by the way, that I never saw these Constitutional Officeholders complain about any raises that were bargained with the Governor for their employees).
Without going into all of the legal jargon, the judge said that, "the Court expresses no views regarding that issue" — which tells me that nothing has changed. We’re still where we were last week when the judge said yes, the Governor has the authority to furlough state employees.
Part of my reason for penning this piece is that you would never know that what I described was the case by looking at the headlines such as in the Associated Press – "Furlough Ruling Does Not Apply To Elected Officials" or in the Sacramento Bee – "Furloughs Don’t Apply to Constitutional Offices, Judge Says." These headlines, based on my read of things, are simply inaccurate.
I guess I have a couple of thoughts on this. One is for our friends in the media — when reporting on legal stuff, call a lawyer (I did) to get it all straight before you write. And my other is to the non-Arnold Statewide Constitutional Officeholders — YOU DIDN’T GET ELECTED GOVERNOR. That is to say that you may like to feel that the civil servants in departments that you oversee are your personal appointees (you each do have a handful of those), but they aren’t. They should be subject to "Furlough Fridays" like everyone else.
In closing, I noted with some concern that Republican Insurance Commissioner Steve Poizner was among those writing to Chiang (see the last page of the attachment below), asking the Union Tool Controller to not impose furloughs on his staff. I get it that Poizner has instituted 10% cuts in his department — permanent cuts. And I also understand that unlike other areas of state government, the Department of Insurance is not funded from the general fund and so cuts do not necessarily help with the budget debacle. That said, at a time like this, considering the political context, it seems like Poizner should not stand in the way of furloughs for DOI employees.
In order to shrink the size of state government to something manageable, it is going to mean changing the culture within agencies. This needs to happen whether they are "general fund" agencies, or agencies paid for with special funds. If Poizner, as he says in his letter, thinks there is still some legal ambiguity about the Governor’s right to furlough DOI employees, then he should issue an order to do so himself. These days, our Republican Governor is not always pursuing public policy goals behind which Republicans can unite. This certainly should be one.