Flurry of Vetoes Shows Governor’s Conservative Bent

Gov. George Deukmejian showed his conservative bent as he completed action on 1985 legislation, repeatedly citing excessive costs to justify a flurry of last-minute vetoes and taking the side of employers over workers on a number of issues.

Citing estimated start-up costs of $79 million, Deukmejian vetoed legislation designed to crack down on tax cheating by service station operators. Supporters of the measure say it could ultimately have saved the state at least $150 million a year.

And Deukmejian, who prides himself on his law-and-order image, vetoed a bill that would have increased penalties for attempted murder--an idea he supports--because the bill also called for spending $6 million in state funds to reimburse rural counties for the cost of trying murder cases.

“It is imperative that the state of California continue to live within its means,” Deukmejian said over and over in veto messages released by his office late Wednesday night as he wound up action on the Legislature’s 1985 work product.

Citing a cost of more than $127 million a year, the Republican governor vetoed a bill that would have increased unemployment benefits. Such a boost, he said, should be accompanied by further limits on who could qualify for the benefits.

Noting heavy opposition from employer groups, he also vetoed a workers compensation measure that would have raised the maximum benefits for employees injured on the job from $224 a week to $273 a week.

And he vetoed a bill by Sen. Nicholas C. Petris (D-Oakland) intended to protect farm workers from accidental pesticide poisoning by requiring farmers to post warning signs in fields immediately after treatment with dangerous chemicals.

The veto drew criticism from Cesar Chavez, president of the United Farm Workers of America, who called it “a stark display of greed and disregard for human life. It is a clear example of the governor’s financial debt to the growers. Californians need to realize that the pesticide poisoning of farm workers is a pervasive problem.”

The state Department of Food and Agriculture has been holding hearings on the issue raised by the vetoed Petris bill. The deparment is widely expected to propose a solution more acceptable to growers.

Deukmejian’s veto of the gas station tax measure brought criticism from the Republican author of the bill, Sen. William A. Craven (R-Oceanside), usually a staunch political ally of the governor.

“It’s extremely shortsighted,” Craven said. “I think they (the Administration) have misread this bill completely.”

The measure was designed to recover at least $150 million from service station operators who cheat the state out of revenues by pocketing sales tax money they receive from customers.

Craven’s bill would have required station operators, beginning next spring, to make part of their tax payments when they purchase gasoline from refiners, rather than after they sell the gas to motorists.

One-Month Grace Period

At first, it would have given station operators a one-month grace period before they would have to begin making payments.

Larry Thomas, Deukmejian’s press secretary, said Thursday that this grace period would result in a net loss of $79 million by June, 1986, just before the end of the next fiscal year. It would have provided an estimated net savings of $45 million during the next fiscal year, he said.

“Changing the mechanism of collecting sales tax prepayments to capture this evasion as proposed by this bill would result in a major initial fiscal year revenue loss,” Deukmejian said.

Craven responded: “Frankly, I don’t know where they came up with their figures. I would be willing to sacrifice $100 anytime to make $1,000.”

The governor’s veto of the tax-cheating bill and other spending measures, Thomas said, illustrates “the importance of having a governor who in the last analysis imposes fiscal discipline on the system.”

Surplus Has Shrunk

Deukmejian has budgeted a reserve fund of more than $1.05 billion for this fiscal year. But according to September projections by the Commission on State Finance, the surplus has shrunk to $909 million.

One major spending bill signed by the governor was a measure by Sen. John F. Foran (D-San Francisco) that will give cities and counties $340 million for the repair of local roads and streets over two years. Of that money, $125 million will come from federal offshore oil revenues.

Deukmejian vetoed a number of bills that would have increased funds for education, including a measure by Sen. Gary K. Hart (D-Santa Barbara) that would have provided $60 million to reduce the size of high school classes to no more than 20 pupils.

Other education bills he vetoed would have provided nearly $20 million for summer school classes, job placement programs at community college campuses and the waiver of fees charged students who drop community college classes.

Deukmejian signed legislation that, in concept, would shift the burden of paying for the court system from the county level to the state. However, the measure by Assemblyman Richard Robinson (D-Garden Grove) contains no money to pay for the change, leaving the question of financing to be decided in future state budgets.

38 New Judgeships

The measure also creates 38 new Superior Court judgeships that Deukmejian will be able to fill.

California Chief Justice Rose Elizabeth Bird, who backed the court-financing proposal, called Deukmejian’s signing of the measure “a victory for good government” that will help “fight crime.”

Deukmejian said he would have liked to sign a measure by Sen. Robert Presley (D-Riverside) that would have increased the penalty for attempted murder from a sentence of five to nine years in prison to seven years to life behind bars.

But the governor said he vetoed the measure because he opposed a last-minute amendment to the bill that would have provided $6 million to help financially strapped rural counties pay for homicide trials.