Details Emerge On Senate Budget Vote

Sacramento, CA — Details are starting to emerge following the Senate’s vote to approve the Big Five fiscal budget plan that was announced Monday evening.

According to the Sacramento Bee the Senate wrapped up its workload at 6:30 this morning following an all-night session.

The most contentious issues were plans to redirect $5.2 billion from cities, counties and redevelopment agencies and a plan to reopen oil drilling off the Santa Barbara coast.

The Senate package includes $5.7 billion cut from education (community colleges, high school and elementary schools), $2.8 billion from the University of California and the California State University systems, $2 billion from health programs, $1.2 billion from the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation and a like amount from social services. State employees will still be faced with three furlough days a month costing them 14-15 percent of their total pay.

The Senate package also calls for the sale a number of state properties, the mergers of several agencies, tightening the eligibility for the state’s welfare-to work-program and the indefinite suspension of automatic cost-of-living increases for the prison system, courts, state universities and colleges. The package also includes increasing scrutiny of the In-Home Supportive Services program that provides aid to the elderly and infirm.

The package now moves to the 80 member Assembly for its vote which may come later today.