4 Rival Budget Plans Yield Capitol Chaos : Spending: Senate moves toward bipartisan compromise package while Assembly Democrats seek a proposal that could bypass governor or Republican leaders. Wilson turns up heat on lawmakers to accept his version.

State Senate leaders, building on a major compromise crafted on local government issues, set out Thursday to complete a bipartisan package that they hoped would end California’s record-setting budget deadlock.

In the Assembly, Democratic budget writers worked behind the scenes in an effort to piece together a plan that could attract enough Republican votes for passage even if it lacks the blessing of Gov. Pete Wilson or the Assembly Republican leadership.

And the governor, putting pressure on lawmakers to accept his budget proposal, announced that his Administration will begin issuing daily reports on the effect the budget impasse is having in every corner of the state.

By day’s end, four overlapping and competing plans were emerging with the aim of ending the 52-day impasse. Each had its core of support but none held the backing of two-thirds of the members of either the Assembly or Senate--the number needed to pass a budget.

“It’s chaos,” said Republican Sen. Frank Hill of Whittier, who has proposed two compromise plans and was putting together a third Thursday. “Now there is kind of a menu to choose from. Take your selection from the bad ideas. Choose your poison.”

More than two dozen bills are in the legislative hopper as part of one budget package or another. Only two are budget bills--item-by-item lists of proposed state appropriations. The rest are “trailer bills,” the measures that would change state law to make one budget or the other work.

For example, the budget bill might have an item reflecting a 4.5% reduction in total spending on the state’s biggest welfare program--Aid to Families With Dependent Children. But because the level of welfare grants is set in state law, a separate, companion bill must pass to cut the monthly stipend.

The one major issue that seemed closest to resolution Thursday was local governments.

Late Wednesday, the Senate approved a two-bill package intended to set counties free to cut locally financed health and welfare programs to cope with the loss of property tax money that seems the inevitable result of any plan that the Legislature and governor agree upon.

The bills fall short of meeting the governor’s demands. But Senate Republican Leader Ken Maddy said he decided to agree to them because they satisfied county officials and seemed to have a good chance of clearing the Assembly.

The measures would give counties more freedom to reduce general assistance grants, the welfare payments that mainly go to able-bodied single men. The legislation would allow counties, depending on their cost of living, to reduce the grants as much as 4.5% below the minimum payment to poor parents with children, which is $326 per month.

The bills also would allow counties to reduce grants to recipients who share housing, impose a 15-day residency requirement for the program and allow counties to withdraw aid from recipients who fail to participate in job training or placement programs. The measures would set aside court decisions or settlements, including one in Los Angeles County, that set the general assistance payments at a level higher than the new cap enacted by the state.

On health issues, the measures would free counties from several restrictions on their ability to shut down medical clinics and reduce services to the poor. Counties are required to give 30 days notice of such reductions and hold hearings to determine if the cutbacks would have a detrimental impact on the poor. If there is a negative impact, the county must ensure that the poor continue to receive a level of care comparable to that available to private paying patients, known as the “community standard.”

The Senate-passed measures, which face an uncertain fate in the Assembly, would shorten the notice period to two weeks and eliminate the requirement that counties determine the impact of their cuts on the poor. The legislation also would delete the “community standard.” Under separate law, counties still would be the caretaker of last resort for the poor, but that care would not have to meet any standard.

To go along with that package, there is growing bipartisan support for a shift of about $1.3 billion from cities, counties and special districts to schools. The schools would transfer the same amount of general fund revenue back to the state to help balance the budget.

That is the figure contained in the latest Assembly Democratic plan put forward by Assembly Speaker Willie Brown of San Francisco. It also is a number cited by Senate Republican Leader Maddy. And Hill said his next plan, which he was drafting Thursday with Democratic Assemblyman Phillip Isenberg of Sacramento, also uses that figure.

The $1.3 billion is a deeper cut than the $1.1 billion Wilson has proposed but is less than the $1.7 billion that was contained in an earlier plan drafted by Hill and backed by Democratic leaders.

The cut, depending on how it is distributed, would represent a reduction of 5% to 10% of the property tax collected by each of the affected levels of local government.

If the local government package comes together, the negotiators will move on to two other thorny issues--schools and health and welfare.

While there is widespread agreement that elementary, middle and high schools should get enough money this year to keep pace with enrollment, there is no consensus on community college funding or on how the schools budget will be crafted. At issue is how much the schools would be guaranteed in the future under Proposition 98, the voter-approved constitutional amendment that sets guidelines for education funding.

On health and welfare, there is general agreement on a reduction of about $1.6 billion. The Democrats have agreed to a one-year, 4.5% cut in AFDC grants, while the governor wants a permanent 10% cut immediately and an additional 15% reduction for families with an able-bodied adult on the rolls after six months.

Both houses of the Legislature met during the day and scheduled sessions Thursday night. The Senate was preparing to vote on additional compromises on housing and higher education issues. The Assembly appeared to be headed for another partisan confrontation even as members from both parties toiled behind the scenes in search of common ground.

Wilson, meanwhile, kept a low profile Thursday after holding a morning news conference with about half a dozen of his department directors to describe the latest effects of the budget impasse. Administration officials said community clinics are closing down, centers for the developmentally disabled are curtailing services and the homebound disabled and elderly are in risk of losing the services of low-wage workers who perform chores to help them remain independent.

Wilson said he has ordered his Health and Welfare Agency to compile daily reports describing the human cost of the budget impasse.

But many of the services cited by Wilson and his directors, while facing temporary hardships because there is no budget, would face deep, permanent reductions if the Legislature passes what Wilson is proposing.

The in-home services program, whose workers are going without pay, would be cut 20% under Wilson’s proposal. Although some developmentally disabled people may have their services suspended if a budget is not passed within the next few days, Wilson’s spending plan calls for extending the waiting period for those services from 60 days to 120.

Brown criticized Wilson for his recent media events designed to turn up the heat on the Legislature.

“It’s time for the governor to get off the press conference circuit and concentrate on the job he was elected to do,” Brown said.

Times staff writers Jerry Gillam and Carl Ingram contributed to this story.