"Senate leader
Don Perata will call the upper house into session today to deal with the deadlocked state budget as the fiscal and human toll began to emerge, with the state controller announcing he withheld more than $1 billion from essential services in a 'dangerous' but necessary move," reports Steve Geissinger in the Contra Costa Times.
"Perata, an Oakland Democrat, would not say Tuesday night whether there had been a breakthrough as he scheduled a 6 p.m. session, spokeswoman Alicia Trost said.
"Withholding of payments will affect everything including special education, community college students and small-business workers, according to the state Controller's Office."
Today's budget impasse gloom and doom is brought to you by child care centers, which
are beginning to feel the pinch. "Child care centers haven't been paid by the state for the month of July -- and even if a budget deal is reached soon, checks won't go out until the end of August, industry officials say," writes the Bee's Aurelio Rojas.
"'Already child care centers around the state are at risk of closing their doors to families if a budget isn't signed soon,' said
Donita Stromgren, policy director for the California Child Care Resource & Referral Network.
"There were some signs of progress at the Capitol, meanwhile. Senate Republicans met with Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger in his office and then retreated to a private meeting without him. Senate President Pro Tem
Don Perata called a Senate floor session for 6 p.m. today.
"But Senate Republican leader
Dick Ackerman said only that talks over the budget, which was due with the new fiscal year on July 1, were continuing.
"He said Republicans stand ready to help facilities that truly need money get by during the budget delay.
"'A lot of those complaints are not founded,' he said. '
Of the ones that may be directly impacted, we have offered to sponsor ... emergency appropriations to handle situations when they don't have the reserves and are totally dependent day-by-day on state funding.'"
Dan Walters
looks at the fight over welfare family sanctions, believed to be one of the last sticking points in the budget. "Overall, California has sharply reduced its welfare load in the past decade, with inflation-adjusted spending dropping from over $9 billion a year to about $5.5 billion and welfare's share of the state budget dropping from nearly 7 percent to under 3 percent. Roughly speaking, welfare and state prisons have swapped financial places.
"While the state still falls below federal compliance standards for work or job training, it's close enough that it might make it without adopting family sanctions, although their enactment would certainly bring the state into line.
"Democratic legislators went along with another Schwarzenegger proposal to freeze welfare grants for a third consecutive year, but they balked at the family sanctions proposal, and as the budget stalemate continues, the partisan lines on the issue appear to have become more rigid.
"Whacking welfare rolls would be an iconic victory for conservatives, and protecting the 'safety net' for the poor is a litmus test for liberals. It's one of those fundamental divides."
While its leaders fight for a balanced budget in Sacramento, the California Republican Party
is swimming in red ink, writes Evan Halper in the Times. "State campaign finance reports that were due by midnight Tuesday will show that the party has millions of dollars more in debt than money in the bank, according to party officials.
Maybe that's because all of their fundraising was in Canadian dollars...
"The party's dire financial situation has alarmed Republican activists, who worry that it will not have the resources needed to run an effective get-out-the-vote campaign in key congressional and legislative districts during the upcoming election.
"The state party
has only $1.1 million cash on hand, money it needs to hold onto to pay day-to-day expenses such as salaries.
"Meanwhile,
it is struggling to come up with a plan to pay off $4.2 million in debt.
"That is in stark contrast to the Democrats, who have wiped out all but a few thousand dollars of debt and
have $5.2 million in the bank."
"California police chiefs and sheriffs
could be violating state criminal law if they issue honorary badges to members of the public, the state attorney general concluded in an opinion released Tuesday," writes Stuart Pfeifer in the Times.
"The decision came 15 months after The Times reported that Riverside County Sheriff
Bob Doyle and San Bernardino County Dist. Atty.
Mike Ramos had issued badges and Los Angeles County Sheriff
Lee Baca had issued identification cards to dozens of political supporters, creating an impression that they were legally empowered.
"Law enforcement officials said the opinion resolved apparent ambiguities in state law and would have a broad and immediate effect. For many years, law enforcement and local and state government officials have issued badges to the public and to employees who were not sworn peace officers."
The Chron's John Wildermuth reports that
strippers and gamblers are rushing to the aid of Mark Leno.
"Strip clubs and gambling interests across California have provided nearly 10 percent of the $455,000 that Assemblyman
Mark Leno has raised in his bid to oust state Sen.
Carole Migden in next year's Democratic primary, according to reports filed Tuesday.
"
San Francisco topless clubs -- including Crazy Horse, the Gold Club, Deja Vu and Saw Entertainment -- and clubs in San Diego have kicked in about $17,000 while Indian gaming interests, race tracks and card clubs from Redding to Ventura have donated $25,000.
"A spokesman for Leno's campaign defended the contributions.
"'Mark has always been a champion of civil rights and free speech and has a broad base of support,' said
Rufus Jeffris. 'He's certainly not targeting these groups, but there are relationships he's developed over his long career.'"
File that last sentence under "too much information..."
"A state appeals court has overruled Gov.
Arnold Schwarzenegger and
ordered the release of a San Mateo man who beat his wife to death with a hammer in 1986 after she taunted him for refusing to have sex," reports the Chron's Bob Egelko.
"
Peter George Cooper, serving 16 years to life in prison for second-degree murder, was granted parole in February 2006 by the state Board of Prison Terms, which said he appeared to have been rehabilitated and posed no danger to society.
But Schwarzenegger exercised his authority under a 1988 ballot measure and overruled the board, saying the vicious nature of Cooper's crime showed he was still dangerous.
"On Friday, the First District Court of Appeal in San Francisco said it had found no evidence to support the governor's decision and ordered Cooper's release from the state prison in Vacaville. He will be freed, possibly by the end of next week, unless Schwarzenegger persuades the state Supreme Court to intervene."
And from our Egg on the Face Files, yesterday, we linked to an item about the ongoing fight over spaying and neutering involving a supposed statue dedicated to service dogs. The story said proponents of AB 1634 were
trying to modify the statue because the dog in question still had his "manhood" intact.
Well, it was early in the morning, the caffeine wasn't flowing as abundantly as it should have been, and we were duped. The story, as it turns out, is a fake, from a site called officialnewsagency.com, which apparently, is anything but.
But really, for anyone who's followed this story, is the fake controversy really that far out of the realm of possibility?
