03/28/2024

Editorial: Crucial issue for 2018 governor’s race? Middle-class jobs

The $125 billion state general fund budget approved Thursday is a welcome reflection of Gov. Jerry Brown’s caution and common sense at a time when California has hundreds of billions of dollars in unfunded long-term fiscal obligations and is overdue for one of its periodic downturns in revenue. No big new program advocated by Democratic lawmakers — such as providing college students with free tuition and spending money — won funding.

This helped explain the unusual level of bipartisan support for the spending plan, with yes votes from five GOP lawmakers — including Assemblymen Brian Maienschein of San Diego and Rocky Chavez of Oceanside. Even a conservative who voted no — Assembly Budget Committee Vice Chair Jay Obernolte, R-Big Bear — said that “on the macroeconomic side” it was “a pretty responsible budget,” with spending hikes in line with inflation.

The budget is far from ideal. It ignored Brown’s call for new state efforts and laws to make it easier to add housing stock to address California’s brutal housing crisis. Instead, Democratic lawmakers continue to focus on subsidized housing programs with a poor record of providing help to more than a relative handful of families. But the spending plan does have some welcome provisions.

One highlight is the expansion of the earned income tax credit to help the self-employed and workers earning up to $22,300 a year, which could increase the take-home pay of 1 million more people in the state with the nation’s highest poverty rate.

Another highlight is a provision that gives the Legislature more control of funding for the University of California’s Office of the President in the wake of a harsh audit that found UC President Janet Napolitano had not disclosed her office’s $175 million in reserve funds while she lobbied for and won a tuition hike. The budget also specifies that $50 million will be withheld from the UC system if audit recommendations aren’t implemented.

The lowlight of the spending plain is its inclusion of last-minute, retroactive changes to the state’s recall elections process meant to block a pending attempt to remove Sen. Josh Newman, D-Fullerton, and preserve Democrats’ supermajority in the Senate. The recall, prompted by Newman’s vote to raise gasoline taxes, is led by former San Diego Councilman Carl DeMaio. The most noteworthy rule change is that counties must now verify every voter signature instead of a random sample, as is the case for other citizen measures.

View Article