Fighting to save public education: California's perfect storm

http://theragblog.blogspot.com/2010/10/david-bacon-californias-perfect-storm.html

Fighting to save public education:
California's perfect storm

Across California, new alliances of teachers, students, state workers, communities of color, and working-class communities in general took on the challenge.

By David Bacon / The Rag Blog / October 25, 2010

SAN FRANCISCO, California -- The United States today faces an economic crisis worse than any since the Great Depression of the 1930s. Nowhere is it sharper than in the nation's schools. It's no wonder that last year saw strikes, student walkouts, and uprisings in states across the country, aimed at priorities that put banks and stockbrokers ahead of children.

UC? CSU? The workforce? California has a 12.6 percent unemployment rate, one of the nation's highest. The state universities dropped 40,000 students this year. UC fees have gone up 215 percent since 2000, and CSU fees 280 percent. Community college fees, once nonexistent, rose 30 percent just last year.

Hundreds of thousands of students enrolled in California community colleges are unable to get the classes they need and thousands of temporary faculty are without classes to teach. So, as in the universities, the student returns for paying higher fees are increased class size and fewer available classes.

Those cuts have an extra impact on students of color. The Los Angeles Community College District educates almost three times as many Latino students and nearly four times as many African American students as all of the UC campuses combined. Read more …http://theragblog.blogspot.com/2010/10/david-bacon-californias-perfect-storm.htmlhttp:

Statement on California's Budget: Temporary Fix Continues to Endanger the Poor & Vulnerable

http://www.cacatholic.org/index.php/topics/budget/923-budget-stmt.html

Statement on California's Budget: Temporary Fix Continues to Endanger the Poor & Vulnerable

Tuesday, 12 October 2010 16:57

Edward E. “Ned” Dolejsi, Executive Director of the California Catholic Conference—the public policy office of the Catholic Bishops of California— issued the following statement in response to the FY 2010-2011 California state budget. There is certainly relief that Legislators and the Governor were able to finalize the state’s budget for FY 2010-2011.  Having said that, however, the signed, sealed and delivered budget appears to be an expedient solution, which only solves the immediate problems of averting the issuance of IOUs, facilitating state borrowing, meeting payroll and paying the state’s vendors. Sadly the Governor’s line-item vetoes introduce more problems for the poor and the vulnerable.  In his zeal to create a $1.3 billion reserve, the Governor cut funding for child-care supporting welfare to work and reduced funding for mental health programs.  The impacts of these decisions will be felt dramatically in the lives of those who are already challenged to survive in our severe economic times. Read more...........ttp://www.cacatholic.org/index.php/topics/budget/923-budget-stmt.html

Third World-style Fiscal Austerity is End Game of California’s 2010 Budget Dea

http://www.californiaprogressreport.com/site/?q=node/8275

Third World-style Fiscal Austerity is End Game

of California’s 2010 Budget Deal

By Willie Pelote
AFSCME

Arnold Schwarzenegger’s decision to slash an additional $1 billion from social programs like child care and CalWORKS after a record-long budget stalemate of 100 days is another example of the fiscal austerity measures that are turning California into a Third World country.

In a statement explaining his recent line-item vetoes, Schwarzenegger said that he was trying to “build a prudent reserve” or rainy day fund.

The purpose of a rainy day fund is to provide cash in lean times or in an emergency.
With unemployment at 12% in California and record rates of poverty nationally, it would seem obvious that now is the time to tap that rainy day fund.

Instead, what Schwarzenegger has done is to siphon off money from the programs and institutions designed to protect us in the worst of times in order to save money for that rainy day fund.

This disturbing development is a preview of what Californians can come to expect, if Schwarzenegger gets his way, and voters are duped into backing yet another of his stale proposals for restricting state revenues on the ballot next year.

Should this happen, the end result would be a steady evisceration of the state’s network of social structures, something that Schwarzenegger has been trying to accomplish over the years by using his line-item veto on funding for child care, special education, and public health programs.

Instead of trying to resurrect an idea that voters soundly rejected in 2009, Schwarzenegger and the legislature should be concentrating on getting big business to pay its fair share by eliminating the billions of dollars of subsidies the state is handing out to multinational corporations.

A recent article by the San Francisco Chronicle’s Washington correspondent Carolyn Lochhead found that Sacramento could produce an annual budget surplus by simply closing loopholes in California’s tax code.

Instead, the Democratic majority has been capitulating to Republican demands to reduce taxes for multinational corporations and big business in exchange for obtaining political agreement on budgets that are transforming California into a Third World country.

California to sell state office buildings for $2.3B, generating money for cash-strapped budget

 

California to sell state office buildings for $2.3B, generating money for cash-strapped budget

California selects buyer for 11 state properties

By JUDY LIN | Associated Press | Oct 11, 2010 6:11 PM CDT in Business

Top of Form

The state announced Monday it is selling 24 government office buildings _ including the Ronald Reagan State Building in Los Angeles and the San Francisco Civic Center _ to a group of private investors for $2.3 billion.

Ron Diedrich, acting director of the California Department of General Services, announced it selected the offer from California First LLC, a partnership led by a Texas real estate firm and an Orange County private equity firm.
About $1 billion of the sale will be used to pay off bonds on the buildings, leaving more than $1.2 billion to go into the state's general fund.
"After an extensive review of more than 300 bids that were received, I have determined that this offer presents the best value for the state," Diedrich said in a statement. "This sale will allow us to bring in desperately needed revenues and free the state from the ongoing costs and risks of owning real estate."
Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and lawmakers included the sale as part of the state budget last week. The Republican governor said California had received solid offers to sell the 24 buildings on 11 parcels and then rent that space back for 20 years at market rates.
It's unclear how the current deal will work out for taxpayers over the long run, but there have been concerns.
The Associated Press reported earlier this year that the deal would end up costing the state $5.2 billion in rent over 20 years, perhaps saddling taxpayers with costs beyond whatever the state would net from the sale. Three of the properties already are paid off, while four others were expected to be paid off in the next five years.  Read more …. http://www.newser.com/article/d9ippj500/california-to-sell-state-office-buildings-for-23b-generating-money-for-cash-strapped-budget.html

Budget Details Sparse as Lawmakers Move toward Vote

http://www.cacatholic.org/index.php/topics/public-policy-insights/921-october-8-2010.html 


The longest budget stalemate in California history may be coming to an end.  Of the $19 billion deficit, less than half of the ‘solutions’ are from cuts -- the remainder is from some optimistic revenue projections and accounting sleight of hand.  

The current budget does not eliminate CalWORKs or other assistance programs.  Those moves were widely considered “bargaining chips” as few lawmakers wanted to cut programs that develop work skills or reduce child care assistance for working families.  Cuts in In-Home Supportive Services were made through a reduction of some hours for providers but also assumptions of lower case loads based on actual data from this year and rosy predictions of Federal funding – a common assumption in many parts of the budget. 

The Governor also held out for reform of the public employee pension system and appears to have at least partially accomplished that goal through the budget and in ongoing negotiations with various public employee unions.  Some business taxes scheduled to expire were also allowed to continue. 

The Governor and legislative leaders of both houses (known as the Big Five) negotiated the deal in secret, despite promises by almost all parties earlier in the year for more openness.  A Senate Budget Committee hearing on the deal lasted for less than an hour on Wednesday.  An eight-page summary of the deal was briefly discussed with the promise that the bills which comprise the budget would be available to lawmakers in the evening.  They did not appear on lawmakers desks until the debate began on the next day (Thursday).

Public Policy Insights - Diocese of Sacramento - California Catholic Conference

http:www.cacatholic.org

Failure to Pass Budget Fails the People

California Politics

This op-ed by Bishop Jaime Soto of Sacramento originally appeared in the Sacramento Bee on Tuesday, Sept. 21, 2010 When lawmakers left Sacramento last month after failing to enact a new state budget, many of them left the concerns of Californians behind, as well. Legislators found time to debate the merits of the state rock and take principled stands for and against plastic bags, but failed at their most fundamental duty – to ensure that we provide for the health, education and welfare of California's 38 million residents, especially its most vulnerable. Carrying out that duty requires reducing the budget deficit and investing our limited resources toward building our future, leaving no one behind. The Legislature's refusal to act keeps postponing hope. Improving educational outcomes, providing access to health care, keeping families together, creating new job opportunities – we all know that these will brighten California's horizon.

Read more...

...

From:

Catholic Legislative Network <leginfo@cacatholic.org> ... View Contact

General Fund Being Drained by Budget Crisis and Government-Induced Drainage Crisis

http://www.californiaprogressreport.com/site/?q=node/8239    

Posted on 05 October 2010

Printer-friendly versionSend to friend

 By Patrick Porgans - Planetary Solutionaries

While Californians are being held captive waiting for Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger and the Legislature to adopt a budget, already more than 80 days late, costing “We the People” $52 million a day; more than $4 billion to date, they are also throwing $100s of millions down the drain and compounding California’s government-induced water crisis.

Within the past decade California has been besieged by a water supply crisis, a budget crisis, a credit-rating crisis, a jobs crisis, an education crisis, a health care crises and a water quality crisis. The water quality crisis was identified as a potential crisis in the 1950s, and has contributed to the pollution of a significant length of the 330 mile San Joaquin River. According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) 215.4 miles of the river are on the 303(d) list, (the latest EPA approved list is from 2006), adding to demise of the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta.

The primary sources of the water quality crisis is from toxic salt discharge from lands irrigated by subsidized water delivered by the federal Central Valley Project to contractors “farming” on the arid west side of the San Joaquin Valley. Millions of acre-feet of water are exported from the project’s Delta pumping plants which transport salt to and from those lands. All of this is being done as the government declares its intent to “save the San Francisco Bay-Delta Estuary” while sanctioning its demise. Common sense dictates that it is not possible to continue sanctioning the dumping of hundreds of tons of toxic salts into the San Joaquin River and the Bay-Delta Estuary annually and expect it to survive.  Read more ... http://www.californiaprogressreport.com/site/?q=node/8239