Assembly budget leaders react with cautious optimism to Brown plan
SACRAMENTO — The top Democrat and Republican on the California Assembly budget committee both reacted with cautious optimism to Gov. Jerry Brown’s budget proposal Thursday, while calling for greater investments in their parties’ divergent priorities.
“What’s good is that there’s a number of similarities or compatibilities between what the Assembly released and what he has in his budget,” said Rep. Nancy Skinner (D-Berkeley), who chairs the Assembly budget panel.
Skinner noted that the plan does not include some of the Assembly’s budget priorities, including universal transitional kindergarten or restoring cuts for Medi-Cal providers. The governor’s plan forgives some cuts that were imposed retroactively on Medi-Cal services, but maintains the rate reduction in the future.
“Here we have a much expanded Medi-Cal population and yet we have providers who are going to receive less for their service,” Skinner said. “So that will clearly be a big discussion.”
Overall, Skinner said, the plan “has good bones. Now we’ll discuss how we add the flesh.”
Assemblyman Jeff Gorell (R-Camarillo), the top Republican on the panel, also praised the governor’s proposal as a solid jumping-off point, but said Republicans would like to see more money socked away in the rainy day fund.
“We need to be careful because these moneys that we have today won’t be there tomorrow,” Gorell said in an interview. “That’s why we’re pushing so strongly behind the governor to put more money in the rainy day fund.”
Gorell expressed skepticism that Brown’s fellow Democrats would follow his “prudent framework.”
“There are enormous influences inside and outside of the building to spend every single dollar that comes in on new programs,” he said.
Gorell also critiqued the governor’s plan to use corporate fees on greenhouse gas emissions, known as cap-and-trade funds, to pay for the state’s high-speed rail project.
“High-speed rail as a concept is broken,” Gorell said. “The state shouldn’t spend any money out of the general fund or the cap-and-trade credit market fund to continue to move high-speed rail forward.”
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Jerry Brown’s budget plan: Pay down the debt; more money for schools
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