The governor is banking on lucky Friday the 13th to help reverse months of sliding poll numbers when he releases his revised budget plan at 1 p.m. this afternoon. But will it be enough to bring those disaffected constituencies back into the cigar tent?
At the redesigned LA Times,
Evan Halper and Duke Helfand break the story on the governor's major education proposal:
a $174 million class-size reduction initiative for the state's lowest-performing schools. "Education officials said the governor's latest plan falls short of what schools need. '
It's a veritable drop in the bucket,' said
Scott Plotkin, president of the California School Boards Assn. 'Part of the agreement we made with the administration last year is that they wouldn't cherry-pick these issues with a few million here or there.'"
The Merc News's Laura Kurtzman reports that the governor will reach out to senior and disabled groups (and
Phil Angelides) by
restoring proposed cuts to programs that help "disabled people afford their property taxes and rent." The Bee's Andy Furillo writes on the May Revise's "
proposal to create a new executive-branch inspector general's office to try to root out potential scandals in the administration before they take hold. ... The proposed inspector general's office would review operations in the Governor's Office, all boards and commissions, departments and agencies as well as private contractors doing business with the state, according to the official."
Sounds like the Schwarzenegger administration is preparing for the next Democratic administration.
Meanwhile, the Times's
Jordan Rau reports that the
pharmaceutical companies (PhRMA) have sued to block the Alliance for a Better California's ballot measure on prescription drugs from being placed on the ballot. "[T]he lawsuit targets a much narrower part of the initiative: a segment that says the state "shall work with the California Chamber of Commerce and the California Labor Federation AFL-CIO" to set up a prescription drug purchasing program for small employers."
"
Article 2, SEC. 12 of the California Constitution: No amendment to the Constitution, and no statute proposed to the electors by the Legislature or by initiative, that names any individual to hold any office,
or names or identifies any private corporation to perform any function or to have any power or duty, may be submitted to the electors or have any effect."
Could the Alliance's pharmaceutical measure be joining the governor's pension reform measure in the race for our
Worst Initiative Drafting of the Year Award?
The Pentagon
released its base mothballing list, and the news was generally good for California. The
Beale, Los Angeles and Travis Air Force Bases were spared, along with the Monterey Language Institute. The people of Concord got
their wish, with a planned shutdown of the Concord Naval Weapons Station.
A Sacramento judge has declared a
bill meant to get around parts of Proposition 209 by providing a limited definition of discrimination violates the ballot measure. "
Ward Connerly called the ruling by Superior Court Judge Thomas M. Cecil another 'nail in the coffin of preferences' based on race, sex, color, ethnicity or national origin. ... Connerly had argued in the suit that Assembly Bill 703, signed into law by Gov.
Gray Davis, was an 'end run' around Proposition 209, a 1996 initiative banning preferences in state hiring, contracting and education."
The OC Register's Capitol Watchdog, Kimberly Kindy, looks into the
state's unevenly applied prohibition on fundraising in certain state buildings. Apparently,
Jackie Speier was told by the CHP that a fundraiser at the California History Museum was off-limits. "'I thought that was a great location,' Speier said. 'I had been to fundraisers there before on several locations. The minute we found out there was a problem, we changed the location.'"
"So why wasn't the location a red flag to Speier? Because former Senate Leader
John Burton, D-San Francisco, and numerous other lawmakers have held fundraisers at that very museum, as well as other state-owned museums. In fact, Assemblyman
Tom Umberg, D-Santa Ana, held a fundraiser in March at the California State Military Museum for his anticipated run for state Senate."
Jackie, perhaps you forgot to flash your legislator badge.
It's been an interesting week here at The Roundup's palatial headquarters. If you missed an issue, it's probably attributable to our ongoing battle with spam filters. On
Tuesday, we mentioned a Brazilian day celebrating the apex of human begetting. And on
Wednesday, we sunk even lower by mentioning s-e-x discrimination. That was enough to send many spam filters into action, bouncing our daily diatribe back to us.
Since we're not going to cave to these overzealous filters, we'll just remind you that you can read the daily Roundup at
www.capitolbasement.com.