State of the Budget

As you probably know, the Governor has released his January proposal for the state budget this past Friday. The process takes several steps which will next require a budgetary analysis by the Legislative Analyst Office (non-partisan) and then the Governor’s May Revise. The May Revise will then be acted on at some point by the Legislature in their version of the budget. So we have just begun the process.

Our Governor is a “lame duck” as he will be "termed out" this time next year. His proposal is certainly optimistic including the notion that he will “protect” us in education – sounds good to me. However, there is little sense that he will be able to deliver on his promise. First, he is counting on the feds bailing him and us out – not likely. Second, as we heard on Friday from Assemblyman Nestande and State Superintendent of Public Instruction O’Connell – we will not undergo any “mid-year” reductions per the Governor’s budget (the unstated issue is that it is predictable that we will have a 2010-11 reduction). Third, this budget is based on lots of assumptions – many of which we question already. Fourth, there are other people and agencies involved that will surely think that they should NOT suffer the full burden of reductions without the participation of public education.

The Press Enterprise had a germane set of articles on Saturday explaining their perspective on the Governor’s budget – first on the front page and then in the editorial section. Dan Walters of the Sacramento Bee whom you may or may not agree with – but Dan has a 30 year longitudinal view of Sacramento and the Legislature – as he has been a columnist and observer that long. He had two relevant columns this week: one on the state of the California economy and a second on the budget proposal from the Governor – I believe both are instructive.

Bottomline, while we are faced with balancing the RUSD budget with all the known information – including no reductions from the state, we need to also prepare ourselves for the coming (though unstated) reduction in the spring and summer. Sorry for this news.