The weather looks great from elsewhere in the country, but here it precedes a budget hurricane threatening schools, cities, and transit programs.
Governor’s plans spark excitement, says the Glendale News Press today, starting with a quote from State Senator Carol Liu (“the devil’s in the details”), who supported Schwarzenegger’s and the legislature’s 2008 budget propositions soundly defeated by voters.
Reducing the amount the state spends on prisons and increasing the amount on higher education is an idea no one can disagree with in theory. But the focus on these two areas reminded me of Liu’s town meeting early last year to push the state budget propositions. She fretted simultaneously over the fact that dental programs for state prisoners might have to be cut, and that she’d gone up to Sacramento with the goal of improving education.
I wondered if she considered prisoners her constituents. It appears that legislators simply cannot fight the entitlement mindsets that mobilize against cuts for any group – prisoners, home health care workers, public employee pension recipients, etc. In theory, law-abiding taxpayers and future citizens (students) should have absolute priority in government spending decisions. In practice, our laws appear hopelessly confused.
Consider the governor’s gasoline tax switch proposal – lambasted today on Streetsblog LA – an end run around transit agencies’ valiant attempts to keep the state from confiscating their funding. What, beyond absolute desperation, could be the logic in raiding transit funds when more people are using public transit, and transportation infrastructure projects could create jobs?
More soon on state education reform, as the next post covers Nayiri Nahabedian’s entry in the 43rd District Assembly Race.