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Sacramento, June 8—The 2008-09 budget has been worked on since January 10, 2008 (a full 16 months) and the Legislature has only 23 days left to work on it. In September of 2008, the 2008-09 budget was passed to fund Prop 98 at $58.1 billion. The current proposal cuts the 2008-09 budget to $49.1 billion
On Monday, June 1, 2009, theoretically a full 2 weeks before the proposed $15 billion cuts to the state budget are to be implemented, a joint legislative committee, called “the Budget Conference Committee,” met to hear from the public on the Governor's proposed budget cuts for everything from early childcare to the university system.
With only Friday, Saturday and Sunday to obtain our goal of 5 CFT speakers to address the meaning of the cuts, we were successful in getting Robert Jones from Local 6084, Cathy Campbell from Local 1078, Mat Taylor and Dan Barnhart from Local 1021 to speak on the certificated and classified cuts to K-12, and Ed Murray from Local 2121 to speak on the community college cuts. Even though it took them a few hours to get to Sacramento they only had 90 seconds to express their concerns. They all did an excellent job in spite of the lack of information from the Governor and lack of time.
Member after member shared stories about the drastic events within their schools and also demanded more revenues, that is, additional progressive taxes. By the responses of the legislators on the committee, we were definitely heard.
Tuesday your Sacramento lobbyists worked on getting bills passed or killed, since this was also the last week for bills to get out of their original house.
Wednesday, we lobbyists spent the entire day having conversations with the more progressive legislators. The message was "no to the cuts to education and please speak to new revenues." While there are definitely some heroes in the Capitol, the feeling is very gloomy.
On Thursday and Friday, the Conference Committee met again to present in detail the Governor's proposals and the Legislative Analyst Office’s suggestions and responses to those proposals. This was really the first time that the legislators have presented and debated in a hearing the details of the May Revise. This is why I said there was lack of information for Monday's public testimony.
One of the reasons is that only parts of the proposals have been coming in. There have been three parts to the May Revise, with each one adding only more cuts.
While action was to be taken during these two days on the subject of education, the legislators (especially the majority party) were unwilling to commit to any real cuts. They did pass a few items that dealt with using federal funds for particular programs, or reallocating lottery monies since Prop 1C failed on May 19. All of these represented a zero sum cut to any program.
Here is a list of some of the more devastating items being debated:
- Cut $2.2 billion from the 2008-09 Prop 98 budget (yes, that is the current year)
- Cut $4.4 billion from the 2009-10 Prop 98 budget for a base of $50.4 billion
- Cut Home-to-School Transportation by 65%
- Allowing schools to reduce the school year up to 7.5 days
- Repeal of SB 1419, which establishes standards for contracting out school district jobs
- Suspension of all mandates, including the 75%/25% rule and the 50% rule in the CCs
- Full categorical flexibility for K-12 and CC
- Elimination of Adult Day Health Care
- Elimination of Adult Ed and RCO/P for CalWORKs participants
- Cutting all but 3 categorical programs by 55%, including the PT categoricals
- Increase Child Care Family Fees
- Eliminate CalWORKs Child Care funding
- Increase CC student fees
- Eliminate funding in the UCs for Student Academic Prep Programs (MESA, Puente Project and EAOP)
While this is not an exhaustive list, it points to the severity of the governor's proposals.
What can CFT members do? Call or meet with your legislator. It doesn't matter if they are Republican or Democrat. Speak to the particular cuts that would affect you and your charges. Tell them that we must raise revenue through a progressive tax policy. Tell them that the people of California didn't put them in office to destroy our educational system.
You can find your legislators using your zip code here.
Take a few moments out of your day and give your legislators a call. Then forward this on to other members and friends of public education and ask them to do the same. We need action to prevent us "from going over the cliff."
In unity,
Jeff Freitas
CFT Legislative Representative
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