Wilson Urges Rebuilding of Public Facilities

Gov. Pete Wilson, saying that the “state of the state is strong and getting stronger every day,” warned lawmakers at their traditional opening legislative session Wednesday that California’s prosperity is still threatened by crumbling public facilities and expanding government.

Wilson said the state has a duty--especially during good times--to repair outdated buildings and structures. He asked lawmakers to place nearly $7 billion in construction bonds on this year’s ballot, aimed at state schools and colleges, parks, prisons, water facilities and environmental resources.

At the same time, Wilson responded to Republican concerns about such major new spending plans by announcing that he will seek voter approval this year for a new and tighter cap on annual growth in the state budget.

“My friends, the [economic] ‘comeback’ is over--we are back,” Wilson said. “California has become the powerhouse of the Pacific. . . . But a word of caution. The nightmare of the early 1990s wasn’t just a recession. California was losing jobs wholesale . . . because we’d ceased to be attractive to investors and job-creators. Never, ever again can we let that happen to California.”

In the past, Wilson has used some of those same themes to mark sharp confrontations with the Legislature’s Democratic leaders over the need to improve the business climate, lower taxes and cut environmental regulations.

But in his final State of the State speech as California’s governor, Wilson pushed very few of those politically divisive buttons. By contrast, he offered some poignant reflection about his final days as governor and he praised bipartisan work on the major accomplishments of 1997.

“I will genuinely miss this job,” he said. “Even on its worst days, this is the most fulfilling, best job I’ve known.”

Wilson began his remarks to the 120 elected members of the state Assembly and Senate who crowded into the historic lower house chambers shortly after 5 p.m. by offering thanks “for your cooperation and hard work that produced a remarkably productive 1997.”

Things were much different last year. Then, Democrats blasted Wilson’s 1997 speech for imposing a mean-spirited “menu of punishments” on state welfare recipients. In one comment that drew sharp Democratic reaction last year, Wilson said the poor are better off being forced into work than they are “sitting on a couch collecting welfare.”

This time, many of the issues Wilson set as his top priorities are high on the list of Democrats. Assembly Speaker Cruz Bustamante (D-Fresno) said he looks forward to a “cooperative” year with Wilson. “The speech was not extreme,” he said. “It was moderate.”

Senate President Pro Tem Bill Lockyer (D-Hayward) credited the governor with “a good, strong, optimistic and uplifting message. I liked it.”

Top Democrats have already offered proposals for school construction and attention to fragile environmental resources similar to the ones that Wilson identified in his speech.

The governor’s plan, which will be sent to the Legislature for approval in coming days, would place a $2-billion bond for school construction on the ballot in June and similar spending plans on each of the following three statewide ballots.

Wilson’s other bond plans call for $800 million to purchase property in fragile ecosystems and improve public access to California’s coast; add more beds to state prisons, improve water storage and flood control systems, and repair aging college and university structures.

In another bow to Democratic priorities, Wilson said for the first time that he will support plans for the University of California to add a 10th campus, in the Central Valley city of Merced.

The announcement was a major reward to Bustamante, who identified a new university in his home district as a top priority for his final legislative term.

The school bonds and college improvements are part of Wilson’s hope to make children and youth “our greatest priority” in the upcoming year.

In his speech, the governor opened a new front in the education reform debate by issuing a sharp critique of schools that allow “social promotion” of students who are not prepared to advance to the next grade.

“If our kids haven’t learned what they must know to compete in this increasingly demanding job market, we must not do them the serious disservice of pretending that they have,” Wilson said.

To prevent unprepared students from advancing, Wilson wants to change the state Education Code to take away local discretion for setting advancement standards and instead require that students pass the statewide assessment tests in grades one, two, three, four, seven and 10 to proceed.

In addition to the testing, Wilson is asking the Legislature once again to approve his plans for an “opportunity scholarship” that would allow students attending the state’s poorest performing schools to obtain a cash voucher that would allow them to attend a public or private school elsewhere.

The Legislature has already rejected the idea. But this time, Wilson aides said they have resolved the debate about how to select the worst performing schools eligible for such a program by imposing the new statewide test that begins this spring.

Many of the proposals in Wilson’s speech have been described to reporters during the past week. Most have been well received in Sacramento with Republicans offering some of the only complaints.

Assembly Republican Leader Bill Leonard of San Bernardino said Wilson’s speech “sounded like the ambitious program of an incoming governor.”

But Leonard has also warned Wilson that lawmakers probably will reject a major component of his school financing plan that would lower the threshold for passing local school bonds from a two-thirds majority vote to a simple majority.

Other GOP members are leery about the state acquiring so much new debt in construction bonds. By some measures, California has already done more borrowing than most states.

Wilson sought to reassure those concerned about growth in state spending by proposing a cap on the state budget.

He said the proposal would mean adjusting the 1979 Gann initiative, which established a formula based on population, per-capita income and school attendance that was used to limit how much the state could spend each year.

During the 1980s, the limit pressured lawmakers into some belt-tightening. The recession in the early 1990s forced the state to make drastic budget cuts. As a result, the Gann limit today is more than $8 billion higher than the current level of government spending.

Wilson said he wants to negotiate with the Legislature about how the Gann limit might be lowered so that it applies more pressure on lawmakers to restrain government spending. In the past, however, Democrats have shown little support for the Gann limit.

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Highlights of Gov. Wilson’s Speech

SPENDING CAP: Wilson would revise the 1979 limit imposed on annual state spending by Proposition 4, known as the Gann Limit. Officials said details would be determined in negotiations with the Legislature and would require voter approval.

UC: Wilson endorsed an existing plan to build a 10th University of California campus, in the Central Valley city of Merced.

BONDS: Wilson proposed $7 billion in new construction bonds for schools and colleges, parks, prisons, water facilities and environmental resources.

HIGH TECH: Wilson will convene a panel of computer industry leaders to help guide state policy and identify Internet commercial opportunities. He also is budgeting $14 million for a “virtual university” in which students could take courses on the Internet.

SCHOLARSHIPS: The governor will revive a proposal rejected last year by the Legislature that would allow students at the state’s poorest-performing schools to transfer elsewhere. The latest proposal is sharply scaled back to target 15,000 students from the state’s worst schools.

PROMOTION: To prevent schools from passing students who have not met minimum standards, the governor would require tests and remedial education programs to identify students who should be prevented from advancement.