Jerry Brown: "My Budget Is Crap" (and other news from the once Golden State)

I'm not sure how the Civility Police reacted when Jerry Brown referred to his new state budget as crap, but as an example of governmental transparency and candor it certainly ranks near the top of any scale that I know about. I for one found that depiction to be both accurate and delivered in language that few will have a problem comprehending. Here is how the NBC Los Angeles news site Prop Zero (click here) illustrates the obvious:

Brown: My Budget Is Crap - California Governor Jerry Brown has a lot of work ahead. It's not often that you hear a governor admit that the budget he's just released is crap. But that's essentially what Gov. Jerry Brown said Thursday. The governor, sounding a bit annoyed at having to introduce the budget 4 days early (after it was mistakenly posted on the web), told reporters over and over how much he disliked his own budget. He called the budget, more than once, "not nice" in its cuts in programs for the poor. He suggested cuts would produce "hardship" and "burdens" for Californians. And then he invoked excrement explicitly. "These numbers emanate from the bowels of the finance department bureaucracy," he said.

Of course, he didn't just call his budget crap just so he could get his South Park on. There was another motive as well. And it could very well have been to push for the tax hike he's been working to put on the ballot this fall. Prop Zero continues:

Crap, of course, is exactly what the political moment calls for. Brown has all but staked his governorship on convincing voters to raise taxes to help the state's finances. To make that sale, Brown must show that he's causing real pain through cuts and that the failure of his tax initiative -- expected to be on the November ballot -- would forestall even worse cuts. If Brown had released a budget Thursday that protected major programs and made people happy, critics would have asked why the new taxes were needed.

Brown faced skepticism from reporters who asked -- in a variety of ways -- whether he was releasing a -- let's call it smelly -- budget just to scare voters into raising taxes. His answer is that these cuts, and his numbers, were reality, albeit a crappy reality. But the document was framed in a specifically political way -- with billions in additional cuts -- mostly to education -- that would be triggered if voters don't approve his tax initiative.

So I guess it will be seen if what we are seeing here is a bold new political marketing strategy designed to awaken the California voters to the reality of the state's dire fiscal predicament, or just the same old crap.

Over at the CalWatchDog site they are quite obviously opting for the latter. This from an article entitled Gov. Brown's Budget 'Holds Kids Hostage' (click here).

In Gov. Jerry Brown's world, welfare recipients are cashing in, while school children continue to get shortchanged. Brown released his 2012-13 budget plan Thursday, warning that spending on K-12 school, state universities and courts will be reduced if California voters fail to pass his $7 billion tax-increase initiative in November.

Brown said his plan would eliminate the deficit and pay down debt - but only if California voters pass his tax increase initiative. If not, automatic trigger cuts will go into effect and cut K-12 school spending by $4.8 billion, state university spending by $400 million, and the state's courts by $125 million.

The article goes on to list a ridiculous menu of out of control state spending, all of which the Governor believes must be spared the kinds of sacrifices education is expected to make. Including the establishment of an entirely new bureaucracy called the "Department of State Hospitals."

Crap indeed.

Our gratitude to Jerry Brown for getting rid of CRAs lasted about two weeks

Which in the grand scheme of things is a pretty long time. We here at The Tattler are usually not quite so generous. However, despite all the euphoria at seeing City governments such as ours completely taken out of the redevelopment game, apparently there is a downside. And we're not talking about a possible sale of City Hall. Which, to be perfectly honest with you, appeals to my rather dark sense of humor. Again we turn to Prop Zero (click here) for enlightenment:

Ending Redevelopment Agencies: Brown's Illusory Victory ... It turns out that redevelopment agencies owe nearly $30 billion in bond debt, which was the way they leveraged local tax dollars into larger pools of money for projects that would be paid for over many years ... Those debts must be honored before redevelopment tax dollars can be returned to local governments -- something that may take as long as 15 years.

Long term, the ending of redevelopment agencies will mean more money for cities and their local services. In the near term, however, the struggles for dollars at the local level will persist, leaving local governments just as starved for funds tomorrow as they were last week.

As we are all quite aware of here in Sierra Madre, the bonds that came out of the shenanigan years are the gifts that just keep on taking. And apparently we will be paying for our CRA bond hangover for a decade and a half.

You know, considering the colossal mess this City Council (and those that they so slavishly toady to) have made of things, we really ought to go ahead with that forensic audit. Let the chips fall where they may. Just a thought.

The California State Assembly chose to opt out of that whole shared sacrifice thing, but they didn't really want you to know about it

It took a lawsuit from the Sacramento Bee and the Los Angeles Times to pull it off, but finally the California State Assembly has been forced to reveal the amounts of money it lavishes upon itself and those who work in their offices. Here is how The Bee (click here) broke this happy news:

California Assembly releases member budgets under court order - Complying with a court order, the California Assembly revealed thousands of pages of documents about its members' expenditures today that it fought against providing to the public. The documents detail budgets and spending by each of the Assembly's 80 members. The data should enable the public to better determine what portion of committee funds are used for lawmakers' personal staff.

The resulting report is now available on the Assembly internet site. Entitled "Salaries and Expenditures" (click here), it reveals some fascinating fiscal facts. And you know how much we love our fascinating fiscal facts.

For total expenses for the fiscal year 12/1/2009 to 11/30/2010 we are talking about a cool $115,758,878.79. This includes such essential categories as car leases, gas and oil, furniture and equipment, travel and per diem, all that stuff. For the fiscal year 12/1/2010 to 9/30/2011 (10 months, the rest of the good news comes later), total expenses comes to $105,585,680.36. All for the same sorts of expenditures.

Once all the numbers are in we will be looking at roughly a quarter of a billion dollars spent on nice office furniture, tasty snacks, and late model automobiles. Or about $3,125,000 per Assemblymember over the two year period. Seems a little excessive to me, and you certainly could buy a lot of school textbooks and chalk with that kind of money. That is, if that was what these folks were really concerned about. Which, of course, they are not.

Anybody ready to get on board with that part-time legislature idea yet?

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