Countdown to the State Budget and More Speculation on the Forthcoming Brown Plan

In the final countdown to Governor Brown's budget message at 11 AM today, Dan Weintraub - longtime columnist for the Sacramento Bee and now with healthcal.org - suggests that there could be a variation on the Budget from Hell strategy we have noted in earlier posts. Under that strategy, Brown presents a Budget from Hell which is all cuts and no added revenue. He then puts on the ballot by June, tax extensions of the Feb. 2009 temporary tax increases. (See the earlier posts for more on possible roadblocks and work-arounds to getting such a proposition on the ballot.) The legislature can pass a Budget from Hell by a simple majority vote thanks to voters last Nov.

Weintraub's alternative is that Brown can (will?) present a budget that simply assumes voters will pass the tax extensions and, hence, is less painful than the Budget from Hell. Democrats might be more willing to pass such a budget and they have the necessary majority to do so. But if they do, and if voters don't approve the tax extensions, the state would emerge in June with an unsustainable budget that assumes revenues that are not available.

The Weintraub article is at http://www.healthycal.org/brown-to-pursue-high-risk-budget-straetgy.html

We will know at 11 AM today.

UPDATE: In another last-minute leak with about 45 minutes to go, the Sacramento Bee is reporting a $500 million cut in the UC budget. http://blogs.sacbee.com/capitolalertlatest/2011/01/brown-to-ask-for-deep-cuts-fiv.html