Clinton’s Aid for California

* Your Oct. 6 editorial challenges the Clinton Administration to address the needs of California aggressively and effectively. This has been President Clinton’s mission since Inauguration Day and will continue to be until the Golden State regains its economic vitality.

Many California-specific initiatives have been undertaken by this Administration during the past nine months:

1. In the most sweeping revision of our export control laws in the last half-century, President Clinton has already eliminated barriers to as much as $37 billion in technology exports, a third of which are produced in California.

2. Nearly two billion in federal transportation dollars have been delivered to the state, including almost $1.5 billion for Los Angeles area rail projects.

3. California has received an additional $500 million for indigent health care and about $300 million for immigrant services that were never delivered under prior administrations.

4. Clinton Administration changes in education aid will direct tens of millions of extra dollars to states like California, which teach disproportionate numbers of lower-income students.

5. And two weeks ago, President Clinton announced the recommendation of a significant new $200 million research facility in Northern California, the B-Factory, that will create hundreds of high-wage jobs and foster just the sort of technological entrepreneurialism that has propelled the California economy for decades.

As The Times has acknowledged, California’s economic strength in the 1980s resulted, in significant part, from defense contracts associated with a Cold War military strategy. With the elimination of the threat that drove those contracts, government spending of that sort has declined and will continue to do so.

With no federal conversion strategy in place prior to President Clinton’s inauguration last January, California businesses that relied on defense expenditures had no road map into the new economic reality of the 1990s. This Administration is changing all that.

A few examples:

* Reversing years of inaction, we will expedite the transfer of closing military facilities to local communities so that economic development can commence immediately--a strategy expressly endorsed by The Times’ editorial. This new commitment has already delivered a portion of an Alameda naval facility to the Port of Oakland for much-needed commercial development.

* We are transforming the many uncoordinated job-training programs into a streamlined re-employment system that will help California’s talented displaced work force apply their skills to the industries of the future.

These initiatives form the core of the domestic recovery program upon which Bill Clinton campaigned and which his Administration has pursued since day one. Are we done? Hardly. Have miracles occurred? No. Are we making progress? You bet we are.

Every member of President Clinton’s Cabinet understands that reviving your state’s economy is essential to the economic progress of the country. The federal government cannot achieve miraculous results alone, but we will do our part. Working with California businesses, state and local officials, and the hard-working and talented people of your exceptional state, we can and will restore hope and opportunity for all.

MACK McLARTY

White House Chief of Staff