[courtesy of California Progress Report]

By Bill Cavala
A veteran of over 30 years in Sacramento

Well, now we have it: the solution to California’s budget deadlock as provided by an elite class of “bipartisan” gurus lead by former Clinton Chief of Staff Leon Panetta.

Editorial approbation will soon follow. Then, when the advice of this group of elders falls upon deaf ears and a harsh, partisan budget fight ensues, the proposals will serve their true purpose: a big stick with which the press corps can use to beat our elected officials about the head to lay the groundwork for yet another ballot measure solution.

What are the proposals and why are they silly? Let’s take them one by one.

(1) Out of control costs”. We must, says Panetta, “make sure the state doesn’t commit programs it can’t support”. Like tougher prison sentences? Of course, when a ballot measure was presented to voters just a couple of years ago to save money by reducing prison time (and expense), it was rejected decisively by voters. So the tough sentences remain, as do the costs – soon to be paid for by taxpayers at the insistence of Federal Judges.

by Paul Rosenberg [courtesy of Calitics - Front Page]

In 1991, California faced a severe budget shortfall.  The LAO's documentation of how it was addressed can be found in its "State Spending Plan for 1991-92" [pdf], a 54-page document.  But to spare you the suspense (and me the time I don't have to read the whole thing), the entire story is neatly summarized in this chart:

What?!?!?  Almost three times as much in increased revenues compared to cost cuts???  Signed by Pete Wilson?  And herr Gropenator is a post-partisan?

Not so much.

An excerpt from the top of the LAO's document can be found on the flip

The State's Budget Funding Gap

The 1991-92 Governor's Budget, released in January of 1991, projected that the state faced an 18-month General Fund budget funding gap of $7.0 billion. As shown in Figure 1(next page), this funding gap represented the amount of savings, increased revenues, and other resources needed to offset:

• A projected 1990-91 fiscal year deficit of $1.9 billion.
  
• The projected 1991-92 operating shortfall of $3.7 billion which is the difference between 1991-92 "workload budget" expenditures and available revenues.
  read more »

[courtesy of The California Majority Report]

If you listened to Republican legislators, even those who know better like Assembly Budget Committee Vice Chair Roger Niello, or columnists like Dan Weintraub of the Bee, their tired budget mantra is that the current budget problem has to do with too much spending. They typically point to spending increases in recent years as evidence.
 
But like so much of California's budget, it’s a little more complicated than the simplistic glance that the right wing and quickie posts like to spend at addressing the real problems facing California.
 
Some have taken a quick look at General Fund spending totals over the past for years and come to the shortsighted conclusion that Government has grown by over $25 billion, or over 35 percent. But this does not come close to being an accurate measurement of spending growth or the growth of Government.
 
A more accurate description of spending levels the last for years is the analogy of a balloon that was squeezed at one end which forces an expansion at the other end. In the end, actual state spending has grown less than the growth of population and inflation over the past four years.
 
Here are some details: