2 Sides Squabble Over Budget Crisis

As a proposal to cut government spending by $3.3 billion sailed through the state Senate on Thursday, Democrats and Republicans in the Assembly sparred over what the Legislature should do next to help bring California out of the red.

Assembly Speaker Herb Wesson Jr. (D-Culver City) said he will suspend all policy committee hearings on the hundreds of bills unrelated to the budget until the last week in March so lawmakers can focus exclusively on California’s fiscal problems.

Republicans said that was not enough, and in a letter to Wesson called on him to cancel all such hearings until “work on a state budget is complete and a budget bill is voted out of the Assembly.”

Wesson said the Republicans were merely posturing, as the plan had been worked out with them.

“This is not something the Republican caucus thought of yesterday,” he said. “This request was first made by Democrats in a bipartisan working group.”

Wesson said the Assembly will also launch a budget road show involving a series of hearings throughout the state to consider the impact of the $17 billion in program cuts proposed by Gov. Gray Davis.

Davis proposed the cuts in January to help close a budget gap estimated to be as much as $35 billion over the next 16 months. His proposal calls for balancing the cuts with $8.3 billion in tax increases, as well as fund shifts and some borrowing.

Many Democrats feel the cuts in the Davis proposal are too steep, and are calling for more tax increases, instead. Republicans continue to say they will not vote for any tax hikes.

Wesson said the first regional hearing could happen as early as next Friday in the Bay Area. Similar hearings were held after the governor released his first proposed cuts in December and served as a rallying point for activists who opposed them.

Assembly Republicans accuse Democrats of dragging their feet. Their letter says that calling off all non-budget hearings over the next few months would “allow the members of the Assembly to focus their time and energy on the development of budget solutions.”

Some in the GOP privately call the regional hearings a sideshow that distracts legislators from reaching an agreement on a spending plan.

The $3.3 billion in cuts that passed in the Senate on Thursday were approved earlier in the week by the Assembly. They include more than $2 billion in education reductions.

Almost half of that will come in the form of a deferral, in which the state delays funding a few weeks so that the money comes out of next year’s budget instead of this one.

Davis says he is inclined to sign the bills. If he does, they will become the first significant budget reductions to take effect.

The Legislature had approved a bill package with the same cuts last month, but Davis threatened a veto because it was tied to a vehicle license fee increase that he opposed.