This morning the “Big 5” will gather to put the finishing touches on a budget deal – so we’re told.  Of course, from all accounts, the deal that has been put together is a mixed bag.  First and foremost, the fact that there are no tax increases on the table demonstrates how budget negotiations can go differently when Governor Schwarzenegger stands tall for taxpayers, as he pledged to do in both of his elections – and it is also a significant feather in the cap of Republican Leaders Dennis Hollingsworth and Sam Blakeslee, both of whom took on the leadership of their respective legislative caucuses after their predecessors rather notoriously used their positions to become architects of over $16 billion in higher income, sales and car taxes – “in return” for faux reforms and selective tax breaks for major corporations.

So while the wallets of taxpayers appear to have been protected from direct assault by state government this go-around, there are some aspects of this budget deal that are extremely troubling – and frankly show that liberal Democrats Darrell Steinberg and Karen Bass worked very hard to maintain what we believe are unsustainable levels of social program spending for California. 

Some of the rather blatant examples of where the role of Democrats in the negotiating process is leading to poor public policy include the “borrowing” of several billion dollars from local governments across the state.  Not only does this represent a new risk to taxpayers as pressure rises for local tax increase campaigns to try and “backfill” this loss – but, simply put, local governments are taking this hit in order to financially support public employee union member benefits, and to prevent further cuts to social welfare programs – which simply is unconscionable.

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This entry was posted on Monday, July 20th, 2009 at 12:00 am and is filed under Blog Posts.