Democrats Vow Effort to Override Veto of Bill Boosting School Funds

As he had warned he would, Gov. George Deukmejian on Friday vetoed a $76.2-million emergency school finance bill, setting the stage for a Democratic-led override attempt in the Senate.

In announcing the veto, the Republican chief executive accused Senate Democratic leaders of giving a higher priority to the complaints of a state employee union than to schoolchildren.

The author of the vetoed legislation, Senate Democratic Floor Leader Barry Keene of Benicia, said he had “no choice” but to seek to overturn the veto, which would require GOP votes in each house to succeed.

‘Political Billy Club’

“The real question is whether Republican legislators will go with the governor or go with the kids,” Keene said in a statement. “Without widespread public clamor for accountability, the governor will use his political billy club to keep his legislators in line.”

The bill, which cleared the Legislature last week against a statewide backdrop of threatened teacher layoffs and reduced educational programs because of a shortage of funds, was aimed at providing additional state aid to local schools and community colleges immediately.

Deukmejian announced March 10 that he would veto the measure unless it specified what source of money would pay for it, other than the general operating funds, the home of his jealously guarded $550-million budget surplus for unforeseen contingencies.

The Keene measure, which would draw from the general fund, would provide $53.3 million for kindergarten through 12th-grade programs and $22.9 million for the community colleges.

Last year, Deukmejian cut in half extra school money the Legislature had earmarked for economically disadvantaged students in urban schools and for busing children in sparsely populated rural areas. This left enough money to pay for only six months of the programs.

He recommended that money to finance the second half of the school programs be taken from a “surplus” of public employee pension funds, a proposal heavily attacked by public worker unions and pensioners. Under intense lobbying, Senate Democrats refused to go along.

In his veto message, Deukmejian said that by refusing to tap the pension funds, Senate Democratic leaders apparently gave “a higher priority to the complaints voiced by the California State Employees Assn. than . . . to funding education.”

Effort Gets Support

Support for an override of the governor’s veto came from the California Teachers Assn., the California School Boards Assn. and the Los Angeles Unified School District, which stands to lose $18.8 million this year if the money is not restored.

No Deukmejian veto has been overridden by both houses, although the Senate voted to do so on an education construction measure in 1984. Democrats do not hold the two-thirds majority in both houses needed to overturn the governor’s veto and would need substantial GOP support to do so.

The bill had cleared the Senate and Assembly with heavy GOP support, which does not automatically translate into a vote to override Deukmejian.