(Quoted from the Los Angeles Times Newspaper)

 There’s plenty of blame to go around in the budget

crisis. Fingers can be pointed at Gov. Arnold

Schwarzenegger, Democrats, Republicans - and you

and me.

July 10, 2009    John Vasconcellos, retired Assemblyman, California State Assemblyman for 38 years.

Our state’s protracted budget crisis sometimes seems unsolvable. But part of the problem may be that those who are trying to solve it don’t fully understand its cause. 

I represented the Silicon Valley for 38 years in the Legislature, and I chaired the Assembly Budget Committee for 15 of those years. As a result, I have some insights into our current crisis that may be useful.

The immediate problem, of course, is a $26-billion shortfall, which we must now plug if California is to pay its bills. But before we can fix things, we have to understand how we got to this point.

A good place to start is with the slew of revenue reductions that have hit the state since 1978, when Californians passed Proposition 13. The initiative dramatically reduced most property taxes and resulted in a 57% reduction in property tax revenue during its first year, and its effects continue.

Another revenue drop came in 1982, when voters passed an initiative abolishing the state inheritance tax. Before that, California had taken in nearly $1 billion a year in estate taxes.

And there are vehicle license fees. Starting in 1998, the fees were reduced incrementally until Gov. Gray Davis raised them to close a budget gap in 2003. When Arnold Schwarzenegger came into office later that year, he immediately reversed the hike — at a cost to state coffers of about $4 billion each year since then.

Add to that the collapse of the dot.com bubble in 2004 — which resulted in a drop of several billion dollars in state revenues from capital gains taxes — and the current global economic downturn and you start to see how state revenues have suffered.

Next, consider a series of structural complications that hamper the Legislature’s ability to come up with solutions. First among them — again — is Proposition 13, which requires a two-thirds vote of both legislative houses to raise taxes. This has meant that a small minority can keep the majority from enacting tax hikes that would help balance the budget.

A good place to start is with the slew of revenue reductions that have hit the state since 1978, when Californians passed Proposition 13. The initiative dramatically reduced most property taxes and resulted in a 57% reduction in property tax revenue during its first year, and its effects continue.

Another revenue drop came in 1982, when voters passed an initiative abolishing the state inheritance tax. Before that, California had taken in nearly $1 billion a year in estate taxes.

And there are vehicle license fees. Starting in 1998, the fees were reduced incrementally until Gov. Gray Davis raised them to close a budget gap in 2003. When Arnold Schwarzenegger came into office later that year, he immediately reversed the hike — at a cost to state coffers of about $4 billion each year since then.

In 1966, Vasconcellos ran for a seat in the California State Assembly; he took office in 1967. By 1980 he was one of the longest serving members of the Assembly, second only to Speaker Willie Brown. Due to the Assembly’s policy of awarding leadership positions based on seniority, he became the chairman of the Assembly Ways and Means Committee, one of the most powerful assignments in the California Legislature.^[1] Vasconcellos proposed the State Task Force to Promote Self-Esteem in October 1986.  In 1989, Brown appointed Vasconcellos to chair the Select Assembly Committee on Ethics. Vasconcellos held the positions until he was forced out of the Assembly in 1996 by term limits. 

In March 2004, Vasconcellos introduced Senate Bill 1606, known as Training Wheels for Citizenship, which would allow people 14 or older to vote. The votes of 14- and 15-year-olds would count as a quarter of a vote, and of 16- and 17-year-olds a half.^[3] The National Youth Rights Association supported the bill, but Republican legislators criticized it. Bob Stern, president of the Center for Governmental Studies, compared this bill’s fractional vote to the policy of the Three-Fifths Compromise, which gave slaves three-fifths representation in the early history of the U.S.^[4] Vasconcellos abandoned the bill after it fell one vote short in the final committee.^[5]

After representing the Silicon Valley for 38 years in the California Legislature, Vasconcellos retired on November 30, 2004. In order to carry forward the vision and leadership of Vasconcellos’ politics, friends and colleagues created The Vasconcellos Project. As its first initiative, The Vasconcellos Project launched the Politics of Trust Network (PTN), a civic engagement enterprise that seeks to become a prime mover in advancing this new vision and practice of politics.

EDITORS NOTE:   Do we need to guess what political party this ex-legislator represents?  We hear all about taxes that have been reduced and how much over budget California has in red ink. Vasconcellos blames the governor while excusing the democratic run assembly and the democratic state senate, which is usual for the high tax spending Demos. But, what about the illegal aliens that are in the state by the millions?  Doesn’t that count for any over budget issues? 

For such a huge state and such a red ink economy, so many legislators want to solve our state’s problems by raising taxes while doing nothing to assist the small businessman, who is really the source of new income in the first place. Is this why so many small businesses as well as big businesses are moving to other states to open their operations. Check Utah, Nevada, and Arizona. All of these states seem to be growing rapidly while Californians are leaving our state by the thousands each day. If you want to get a job, sign up to drive the U-Haul trucks back to California once the rentors have moved out-of-state.

Editor:    Blog.jetsettingmagazine.com     and     Los Angeles Times