State Legislators Delay Vote on Budget, Likely to Miss Boat on Deadline--Again

The Assembly, after narrowly approving an amendment to restrict state-paid abortions for poor women, delayed a vote Tuesday on its proposed $45.1-billion version of Gov. George Deukmejian’s budget.

The delay, coming on the eve of the deadline established in the California Constitution for the Legislature to complete its work on the budget, means that lawmakers are all but certain to produce another late budget, the seventh time in the last 11 years that they will have missed the deadline.

Series of Negotiations

Even if the Assembly had approved its version of the budget, the vote simply would have set the stage for a final series of negotiations by members of a two-house conference committee to resolve differences on spending priorities that exist between the Senate and Assembly.

The abortion amendment, variations of which have been added to state budgets for the last 10 years, was introduced by Assemblyman Bill Leonard (R-Redlands). Approved 38 to 37, it would prohibit abortions to women eligible for the Medi-Cal program except in cases where the mother’s life is in danger, or in cases where the pregnancy results from rape, statutory rape and incest. Such prohibitions have always been ruled unconstitutional by state appellate courts.

Immediately after the amendment was approved, Republicans moved to suspend the rules and take an immediate vote on the larger question of the state budget. Normally, action on amended bills is delayed a day unless there is a reason to expedite the vote.

But Democrats, most of whom voted against the abortion amendment, refused to expedite the budget vote.

Assembly Republican Leader Pat Nolan of Glendale charged that the majority party was delaying the vote in order to muster support for legislation to increase taxes and raise $800 million for the cash-short state Treasury.

Nolan later sought to send a second version of the budget, already approved by the Senate, directly to the governor, a move that would bypass the conference committee. However, the action failed to receive the two-thirds majority it needed.

Stays in Committee

As a procedural matter, the Senate version of the budget now will stay in the Assembly Ways and Means Committee.

As a practical matter, missing the deadline has no effect because lawmakers suffer no penalty for being late. Over the years there have been mutterings about suspending lawmakers’ pay or imposing other penalties aimed at insuring more timely action on the budget, but they have never gotten anywhere.

Many lawmakers view July 1, the start of the new 12-month budget year, as the real deadline. That is because if the new fiscal year starts without a new budget in place the state lacks the legal authority to spend money. However, the state has always continued to send out checks anyway, assuming that a budget will be passed.

The record for late adoption of a budget was set in 1983, when Deukmejian signed the spending plan for 1983-84 on July 21, two days after it was sent to him by the Legislature.

Assembly Speaker Willie Brown (D-San Francisco) predicted that the conference committee will complete its work in time to send the governor the budget by July 1.

As it stood awaiting a vote, the Assembly’s $45.1-billion budget calls for substantially more in spending than it has revenues to pay for it.

The key general fund portion of the budget, which contains appropriations for continuing state operations and payments to school districts and other local government agencies, contains $728 million more in spending proposals than it anticipates being able to pay for with available tax revenues. In addition, lawmakers added $150 million in spending on bond and special funds. And the budget, as it stands, does not contain the $600-million reserve that Deukmejian proposed as a cushion against unforeseen fiscal emergencies.

Adding all that up, it means that the budget now is about $1.5 billion off the level set in the governor’s budget.

The conference committee may be able to scale back the Legislature’s spending proposal substantially.

Could Gamble on Economy

And given the state’s financial situation, Deukmejian could further reduce his proposed reserve and take a chance that a rising economy will bring the state unexpectedly high revenues.

The Commission on State Finance, a nonpartisan state agency that monitors state revenues and expenditures, is estimating that tax payments next year will be $308 million more than the revenue assumptions the governor is making in his budget.

Indications are that the conference committee will adopt the commission’s rosier revenue estimate.

The Speaker also indicated a willingness to cut the appropriation of $370 million put into the budget by Deukmejian to finance the state’s plan to assume financial responsibility for the trial courts. Counties, which have been planning on receiving the money, likely would put up strong opposition to such a move.

Brown said he does not think that either of two tax-increase proposals put forward by Democratic budget committee chairmen will get the necessary two-thirds majorities in each house needed for passage. Each of the measures would raise $800 million--one by raising the top state income tax rate from 9.3% to 10.3%, and the other by freezing tax brackets for a year, rather than allowing them to be adjusted for inflation.

‘I’m a Realist’

Brown told reporters at a Capitol news conference: “I’m a realist. I don’t think that there are 27 votes and 54 votes (in the respective houses) for any new revenue opportunities that can in any manner be labeled an increase in taxes.”

In another development, state Supt. of Public Instruction Bill Honig, who was at odds all last year with Deukmejian over the budget, sent the governor a letter urging him to support Democratic efforts in the Legislature to pass the tax legislation.

Honig urged Deukmejian to support increasing the top income tax rate of 9.3% up to 10.3%. Last year, Deukmejian signed legislation lowering the top rate from 11% to 9.3% as part of an overhaul of the state income tax system. Honig argued that lowering the top rate produced a windfall for the state’s wealthiest taxpayers.