Governors are like card sharks when dealing out budgets. They’ve usually got gimmicks tucked up their sleeves.
Legislatures tend to follow suit — at least when there’s lopsided one-party rule, as there has been in Sacramento for the last 14 years.
Budget season has just opened in California’s Capitol. Gov. Gavin Newsom proposed a $322 billion state budget in January for the fiscal year beginning July 1. After an inexcusably long pause required by outdated legislative rules, budget committees now have begun plowing through the weeds of the governor’s spending plan.
One Newsom gimmick has drawn little attention amid Los Angeles-area wildfires and all the focus on chaos generated by President Trump.
To help balance his budget, the governor wants to grab roughly $300 million from the $10 billion climate bond approved overwhelmingly by voters in November.
OK, that’s only a fraction — 3% — of the bond total. But it’s the principle of the money grab. It could set a pattern for this governor and his successors to continue dipping into the climate bond pot to balance budgets.
“We could probably expect to see more of that in the out-years,” says Republican Sen. Roger Niello of Fair Oaks, a Sacramento suburb, who is vice chairman of the Senate Budget Committee.
“The governor certainly uses whatever funds he can find to balance the budget, and the Legislature does pretty much whatever he asks.”
