No Vote on the California State Budget, But Some Interesting Developments: Tasty Morsels from the Hallways of the Capitol

SFN: Well look, the Republicans have made a point about a significant reduction in the operating budget. That has a multi-year impact on California’s fiscal situation. And the fact of the matter is we do have to get our fiscal house in order. At the same time, while the Republicans push for fiscal solvency, Democrats want to maintain social programs that are important to California’s future. I think what you do is balance the two. You show fiscal restraint, but at the same time, you show the compassion that Californians want us to have for the needy, and we’ve done that in this budget.

Q: This report of cutting education funding that the Republicans are pushing, what would you say?

SFN: At this point, I can tell you that we will not be cutting K-12 education.

Q: What are the main points of negotiation?

SFN: At this point, I’m not going to get into details about the negotiations themselves other than to say that a lot of progress has been made.

Q: Are they more flexible, the Republicans?

SFN: I think everyone is working closely together.

I then ran into Republican Assembly leader Villines in the hallway about an hour ago, as he was coming out of a meeting with Speaker Nunez, and this is what he said:

“We’re simply saying we want to get to a spot where the budget is as close to zero as possible and there’s a lot of different ways to get there, and now let’s get to work. I mean, you know, frankly we’ve put even public safety programs on there to say “We’re willing to talk about all of them, so in terms of how we get there at the end, I’m not sure, but we’re going to keep working.

Q. What’s the rationale behind doing things in private as opposed to public?

A. Well, you know, any budget that we vote on is going to be done in public, it’s going to be a public document, it’s going to be debated on the floor, it’s going to be a very public document that we get to. In terms of negotiating, I think that what we’ve got to do is to find out where we are willing to go as caucuses, and what is the responsible way to get there, and once you have hat, you’ve got to go public with that, and that’s what we’re trying to do.

Q. I’ve always wondered about that because you have the budget conference committee as public, committees are all public now, there’re out there for everybody to see. And yet people disappear into caucuses and and they’re gone for an hour at a time or longer. If you did that in local government, you’d be violating the Brown Act, I believe, in most cases.

A. I’m not sure about local government, but I know this. In terms of conference committee and other places, Republicans don’t have an equal stake in the outcome. But in terms of the overall budget, and the requirement, we do have a bigger stake. And that’s why, unfortunately, the way the system is, is that the negotiations we’re able to have a bigger part in, frankly, are after conference committee. If Republicans wee running the conference committee, you would have seen it down to a number that we want it to be at now. But we don’t. And so, and I say that in the sense of, you know, humility. We want to work together to get this done. Conference committee doesn’t give us that opportunity, frankly.

Q. You don’t think John Laird [the Democratic Assemblymember who chaired the budget conference committee] would have liked to have had an agreement coming out of the conference committee?

A. I don’t think John Laird’s agreement would have been the same as Roger Niello’s [the lead Republican on the conference committee] is what I’m saying. We are trying to get to the middle ground here as best as we can.”

So, there you have it. I’m not so cynical to believe that Villines truly wants a budget as close to zero as possible. I think he meant what he considers to be a deficit in the budget as close to that number.

But clearly the process that is there for all of us to see is not one deemed by the Republicans to be to their advantage. As for the public process, what this will probably amount to is an announcement of a deal that has the support of enough members from both Democratic and Republicans in the legislature that a two-thirds vote can be cobbled together. Of course, by then it’s a done deal. There will be a public debate. There will be no chance of amending it and probably no opportunity for those who care about different parts of it—not to mention the public at large—to know about it and express their feelings about it before it is voted on by the legislature.

Why is a public process better than a public one? Why have all the public process before we get to this point? And why is it that the Republicans like all this secrecy? More questions to ponder for the future—and next year.