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Speaker Rendon On California Budget: "We're Going To Have To Live Within A Different Set Of Means"

bobglennan
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Flickr / Creative Commons
California State Capitol

The coronavirus crisis has drawn pretty much all of California’s attention for the last month. But there are many other items that need to be considered, soon, including the next state’s budget.

Governor Gavin Newsom submitted his proposed budget for the next fiscal year back in January. The document proposes spending 222.2 billion dollars beginning July 1st to fund state projects. Now, he says, the whole thing needs to be reconsidered. According to the state constitution, the budget must be approved by June 15th — just two months from tomorrow. That doesn’t leave a lot of time to figure out the Golden State’s new fiscal reality. But that’s the task, now, for Newsom and the state legislature, which is currently on forced recess. Assembly speaker Anthony Rendon says paying for programs the democratic supermajority wants could be a thing of the past.

"Look, I got elected in 2012," Rendon said, "and my class has lived a very charmed life here in Sacramento. We got here after the recession. I think we’re going to have to live within a different set of means. And any bill that’s going to have a significant price tag is going to have to be looked at differently. We don’t have a sense of what our revenues are going to be, yet. We certainly don’t have a sense of what our costs are going to be, yet, as a state. So I think any bill that has a big financial price tag is something we’re going to have to take a much closer look at."

 

For his part, Governor Newsom says his team is working on a new budget. But first, they’re planning the social and economic recovery from the coronavirus shutdown.

Ben joined KALW in 2004. As Executive News Editor and then News Director, he helped the news department win numerous regional and national awards for long- and short-form journalism. He also helped teach hundreds of audio producers, many of whom work with him at KALW, today.