State Republicans propose $22 billion in budget cuts
By epearlman
Monday, December 15th, 2008 at 9:42 pm in California, Prop. 13, Prop. 98, Schools, the economy.
Despite having strong majorities in both the California Assembly and the Senate, California Democrats have little power to take action to make budget numbers line up. Any new taxes in the state require two-thirds vote of both legislative bodies, so staunchly anti-tax state Repubs can block any legislation they like. It’s pretty much the reverse of majority rules.
Republican cuts in the package presented today:
* Cutting monthly payments for supplemental security income recipients – to $830 from $870 for singles, and to $1,407 from $1,524 from couples
* Cutting nearly $10 billion from K-12 education over the next 18 months
* Cutting $6 billion from higher education funding
More state budget crisis details here and here and here and here.
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December 15th, 2008 at 9:59 pm
$10 billion in state cuts means roughly $10 million in revenue cuts to AUSD — a figure that should make anyone reading this feel very, very alarmed.
As a refresher: Last year’s projected cut to the state’s public schools was $4 billion ($4 million to AUSD). This created a fiscal emergency for the district. Now we’re looking at cuts that are more than twice as severe.
And that’s not counting a potential loss of Measure H funds.
Pretty scary.
December 16th, 2008 at 6:41 am
On the Federal front, Barack Obama names his Education Secretary today:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/12/15/arne-duncan-to-be-named-o_n_151251.html
December 16th, 2008 at 7:10 am
On the State front, a Contra Costa Times reporter explores the doosday scenario of having to end the school year early due to a lack of monies:
http://www.contracostatimes.com/search/ci_11191813
December 16th, 2008 at 10:05 pm
Call your (our) state reps and encourage them to fight the California Redevelopment Association’s lawsuit to prevent the transfer of redevelopment funds to education funding. Encourage them to support the transfer of developer subsidies to fund education instead.
http://actionalameda.org/actionalamedanewsblog/2008/12/04/california-redevelopment-association-sues-state-for-education-funds/
December 17th, 2008 at 1:42 pm
Thanks for the links, Mike.
We probably shouldn’t tell the children they could end up getting out of school early — they’ll start writing letters to their representatives, begging for ever-greater cuts…