"Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger wants $3.7 billion a year in new federal funding to cover a big chunk of his healthcare plan for Californians,
putting him on a collision course with budget hawks in the nation's capital and leaders in other states seeking assistance," writes Ricardo Alonso-Zaldivar in the Times.
"The sheer size of the federal allocation Schwarzenegger's plan would require is raising eyebrows.
"'That's a big number on an annual basis,' said Sen.
Judd Gregg of New Hampshire, the ranking Republican on the Senate Budget Committee. '
California hasn't yet passed a law [implementing the governor's plan], but when they do, I would think people are going to take a deep breath."
"The cost of helping states fund their health plans has already attracted the attention of budget cutters because it is complicating President Bush's stated goal of balancing the federal budget in five years. In his new budget, scheduled to go to Congress on Monday, Bush is expected to call for a substantial slowdown in federal healthcare spending. Some of the cuts Bush proposes could affect programs Schwarzenegger is counting on to help pay for his plan, such as Medicaid."
Meanwhile, the Register's Brian Joseph reports, "
Senate Republicans will unveil a health care plan today that's
dramatically different from ones already put forth by Democratic leaders and Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger.
"The GOP plan does not try to cover the 6.5 million uninsured residents the governor addressed in his State of the State speech. Rather, Republicans say they want to provide Californians with greater access to health care while helping 1 million residents they say are truly in need."
"The state's perpetually delayed high-speed rail project faces yet another funding setback. And this one could be fatal, dashing the dreams of bullet train enthusiasts, including many in California's Central Valley," writes E.J. Schultz in the Bee.
"Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger proposes slashing funding for the High Speed Rail Authority from $14 million to $1.2 million, leaving the group with enough just to keep its doors open. The Legislature has yet to vote on the governor's spending plan.
"'There's really no public purpose for me and my staff to be in office unless you want to move forward with the project,' said
Mehdi Morshed, the authority's executive director, who wants the governor and lawmakers to approve $103 million for the project next year. '
If you don't want to move forward with the project, then close it down and save yourself some money.'
"With his focus on road building, the governor also wants the Legislature to indefinitely delay a $9.95 billion rail bond slated for the 2008 ballot. That would clear the way for $29 billion in bonds the governor wants to put on the ballot to pay for courthouses, schools and dams -- the second phase of his "strategic growth plan" that would spend billions of dollars on roads but nothing on high-speed rail.
"'
In our plan that we put together, it didn't fit in,' Schwarzenegger said in an interview last week. 'It doesn't mean that it is not going to fit in in the future.'"
Dan Walters
takes a look at the governor's proposed budget after the LAO's preliminary review. "Schwarzenegger's version of the semantic game is the "operating deficit," which he and his aides more or less define this way: It's balanced if you leave out some expenditures that are optional and if the Legislature agrees to make more than $3 billion in spending reductions and fund shifts.
"Those are very big "ifs," and the assumptions are very shaky. Using her characteristically bland language, the Legislature's budget analyst,
Elizabeth Hill, says the budget contains "a number of optimistic assumptions" and more than likely, will "ultimately fall short" of closing the chronic income-outgo gap.
He means bland in a good way, Liz...
Walters calls the idea of a balanced budget "more fantasy than reality."
The Bee's Shane Goldmacher writes: "Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's
pick to chair the state's parole board is in jeopardy, as he is scheduled to face hostile Senate Democrats at a confirmation hearing Wednesday.
"
James Davis, chairman of the Board of Parole Hearings, has served in that post since June, when he replaced Susan Fisher, another Schwarzenegger nominee who waded through a confirmation battle.
"On Monday, Senate President Pro Tem
Don Perata, D-Oakland, would not comment directly on Davis' nomination, but said he had "general concerns about the board of parole."
"'You know things just don't ever seem to get better,' said Perata, who chairs the Senate Rules Committee. 'When we had our last full hearing on the parole board, we tried to make our position pretty clear, both with the composition of the board and the fact that some of us do believe in redemption.'"
"The
emotional debate over spanking reignited in California when Assembly Speaker Pro Tem
Sally Lieber, D-Mountain View, said she plans to introduce a bill this week outlawing anyone from swatting children age 3 and younger. Violators could face up to a year in jail or a $1,000 fine," writes Ilene Lelchuk in the Chron.
"The public reaction to her announcement has been fierce. Lieber has been swamped with requests for national media interviews, her staff said. Her opponents are telling the legislator, who has no children, to butt out. The harshest critics have been calling her office and cursing at interns who answer her phones. Her supporters, meanwhile, are saying a slap on the rear can cause irreparable harm.
"The only consensus so far is that Lieber faces an uphill battle.
"'Almost everyone has been spanked as a kid, and they say, 'Well, I've been spanked, and I turned out OK,' and most of them have spanked their own kids,' said University of New Hampshire sociologist
Murray Straus, who has studied spanking since 1969."
(What an epitaph. But we digress...)
"
California must bolster efforts to catch
substance-abusing paramedics but also should consider creating a program that offers treatment and support before they commit crimes, state legislators said Monday," writes Andrew Mcintosh in the Bee.
"The calls come after a Bee investigation revealed an increase in the number of California paramedics who are abusing drugs or alcohol and, in the worst case, committing crimes and putting patients at risk.
"'
You shouldn't have to be worried about your first responder being high or picking your pocket when you call for help,' said state Sen.
Abel Maldonado, R-Santa Maria, a member of the Senate Health Committee. One, we might ad, who seems all too ready to introduce some legislation...
"'It's not tolerable, and it needs to stop,' added Assemblyman
Alan Nakanishi, R-Lodi, vice chairman of the Assembly Health Committee."
"About 200 professors, students and union organizers
rallied at California State University, Sacramento, on Monday to protest frozen faculty wages," reports Eric Stern in the Bee.
"They marched across campus toward the Sacramento Hall administration building -- and through it -- carrying signs and chanting, "I don't want to strike -- but I will."
"The crowd also railed against a proposed 10 percent student-fee hike and jeered campus administrators for their pay and perks. The demonstration was one in a series planned on CSU campuses across the state over the next month by the 23,000-member California Faculty Association, which is threatening to strike unless administrators offer a better contract.
"CSU system officials say they've made an "excellent" offer for raising faculty pay over the next four years, amounting to 27 percent in some cases.
"'The CSU wants to come to an agreement with the faculty union so its 23,000 faculty members can receive the salary and medical benefits they deserve,' according to a statement issued Monday by the CSU chancellor's office in Long Beach."
Here's a shocker from Planet Berkeley. A local judge ruled against football fans, and in favor of tree huggers. "UC Berkeley's wide-ranging
plans to upgrade Memorial Stadium and its environs came to a halt Monday when a judge sided with a group of tree-sitters, the city of Berkeley and irate neighbors opposed to the project," reports Carolyn Jones in the Chron.
"Alameda County Superior Court Judge
Barbara Miller granted an injunction stopping UC from moving forward with plans to build a $125 million athletic training center, a 911-space parking garage and a building for the law and business schools. The order also blocks the seismic retrofit of the crumbling, historic stadium, which sits atop the Hayward Fault.
"The case is expected to go trial in three to six months."
"The campaign of an Orange County supervisorial candidate, whose slogan is "Honesty, Integrity and Leadership,"
has been caught doctoring a photo so that it places the politician close to Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger," reports Mai Tran in the Times.
"The photo into which
Trung Nguyen was inserted appeared over the weekend in two Vietnamese-language daily newspapers, Vien Dong and Viet Bao Kinh Te. The papers are heavily circulated in Little Saigon, home to the largest Vietnamese community outside Southeast Asia.
"Nguyen's campaign variously blamed the alteration on an advertising company and a volunteer.
"
Saulo G. Londono, Nguyen's campaign manager, called it 'a very stupid mistake made by a third-party vendor. We don't want to go in great detail into what the vendor did, but we definitely made sure it won't happen again.'"
Actually, Nguyen
got the idea from Mike Sweeney's locker.