In a report released today, the non-partisan Legislative Analyst’s Office called on the California Legislature to reject the Governor’s proposed constitutional amendment that would restrict the state’s spending decisions on universities and prisons.
The LAO nixed the proposal because:
1. (it) would unwisely constrain the state’s ability to allocate funding where it is most needed each year;
2. is unnecessary, as the state already had the ability to shift funding among programs without this constitutional amendment.
Read the LAO report here.
I agree with the LAO for the reasons stated and because the Governor conveniently omitted the billions of dollars California taxpayers spend on community colleges (read my blog post from Jan. 6) in an effort to skew the argument.
Even though the Legislature should reject the Governor’s proposal, that doesn’t mean we should walk away from our responsibility to trim unnecessary costs at our prisons. We can begin by removing the federal receiver from our prison health care system, which would result in an approximate $2 billion savings per year.
It’s a genuine solution (the Governor mentioned it in his annual budget address earlier this month and I have said it time and time again) – not just cheap talk that generates nothing more than press clips.