Chances Dim for Budget Accord : Spending: Legislators struggle to reach compromises on eve of deadline. The $53.3-billion plan faces GOP opposition and tepid Democratic support in Assembly.

With prospects all but doomed that the Legislature would pass a budget on time, lawmakers struggled late Tuesday to find compromises on major issues ranging from taxes to welfare cuts.

Assembly Speaker Willie Brown said he would not bet on the budget being passed by day’s end, the June 15 constitutional deadline.

A version of the state budget appeared to be headed for a possible vote in the Assembly on Tuesday night. But the complex $53.3-billion spending plan drafted by a joint Assembly-Senate conference committee faced stiff Republican opposition and only lukewarm support from Democrats.

When even some Democratic legislators objected to the budget proposal early Tuesday, the Democrat-dominated conference committee promptly reconvened and made deeper cuts, these aimed at the state’s cost of caring for illegal immigrants.

Although Republican and Democratic legislators have found common ground in many areas, they remain split over major issues--including whether to extend what was supposed to be a temporary half-cent sales tax increase for a year or more, and whether to shift $1.3 billion in local tax money from cities and counties to schools.

“That’s like saying, ‘I’ve got this great house, but it’s on fire, it’s built on a fault and the bank is moving in to repossess it,’ ” said Sen. Mike Thompson (D-St. Helena).

Although legislators were pessimistic about a quick resolution, none expect the fight to become as bitter as last year’s budget war, when Gov. Pete Wilson and the Legislature were at an impasse for more than two months.

Sen. Frank Hill (R-Whittier), among the main mediators for last year’s budget, predicted that the Democrat-controlled Legislature would ultimately produce a budget close to what Wilson wants. But the spending plan would exact such pain, particularly in local governments, that it will cause Wilson grave political damage, he said.

“They’re going to give the governor all the rope he needs to hang himself,” Hill said.

The discord among Democrats became apparent during their private caucus Tuesday morning, when Assemblyman Richard Polanco (D-Los Angeles) clashed with Ways and Means Committee Chairman John Vasconcellos, the chief architect of the legislative budget.

Polanco was among a group of legislators who recommended that the Department of Corrections eliminate $250 million earmarked for the incarceration of illegal immigrants. Those legislators favor turning illegal immigrant felons over the federal government for imprisonment or deportation.

At the same time, Republicans demanded that $60 million be trimmed from the Medi-Cal budget. That money was earmarked for prenatal care for women who are illegal immigrants. In general, illegal immigrants are ineligible for Medi-Cal, but an exception is provided for prenatal care.

The budget committee reconvened and made those two cuts, opening the way for the budget to go to the floor Tuesday night.

Vasconcellos, a veteran Santa Clara Democrat, said in an interview that while he detested the cut for pregnant women, he believed that the care would still be given at government expense by other means.

All through the day, a stream of Republican and Democratic lawmakers visited Vasconcellos’ office in the Capitol, negotiating details big and small. The joint budget committee was scheduled to meet again today.

Wilson remained opposed to several key elements of the budget before the Legislature.

The legislative version of the budget envisions a 4.2% cut in the general fund, down to $39.6 billion from last year’s level of $41.2 billion. It would guarantee public school funding at this year’s level--$4,209 per student, including state and local funds.

The proposal also includes extending the temporary half-cent sales tax for at least a year, and would transfer $1.3 billion from counties, cities and local governments to schools.

It would also boost community college fees by $2, to $12 per unit, loan the colleges about $250 million and provide the state’s two university systems with $50 million more each than proposed by Wilson.

The legislature’s budget is $2.3 billion larger than the governor’s budget, in part because the governor sought to save the state money by using more local property tax revenues to fund schools. Another difference is that the governor wants to extend the half-cent sales for six months and use the money for local spending, while the Legislature would extend the tax for a year or more with the revenue to be used by the state.

In Orange County, meanwhile, officials threatened to defy Wilson’s plan to take $2.6 billion in property taxes from counties and cities. Supervisors voted unanimously to support a policy of ignoring any such order.

“During frustrating times like this, our county must take this type of action,” Supervisor Thomas F. Riley said before initiating the board action, which adds Orange County to a list of 45 California counties already protesting the state’s planned raid on local tax revenues.

The stalemate in Sacramento also brought Los Angeles County’s grim budget deliberations to a standstill.

The County Board of Supervisors was presented Tuesday with the staff’s $12.3-billion spending plan--including $1.6 billion in budget cuts--but the matter was tabled for a week in hopes that the state would resolve its problems without making further cuts in revenues for local jurisdictions.

In related action at the Capitol, the Senate Judiciary Committee voted unanimously to approve a bill by Sen. Art Torres (D-Los Angeles) that would order the state Department of Corrections to immediately turn over any illegal immigrant felons to federal authorities.

The Immigration and Naturalization Service would hold the felons in custody but deportation would be subject to an order by a federal judge, thus taking the responsibility out of California’s hands.

Death Row inmates would be excluded and kept in California prisons.

Based on a legislative study, Torres estimated that there are 15,000 illegal immigrants in California prisons that cost state taxpayers $350 million a year.

Asked what assurance he had that federal immigration authorities would accept undocumented felons when handed over, Torres said, “They must do so. This guy is undocumented. He’s here illegally. He’s yours,” he said, meaning U.S. federal authorities.

“We simply shift the responsibility and then let worry about (successfully deporting foreign felons), and while they are worrying about it, let them pay for it.”