Brown Uses Children's Story to Explain California's Budget Situation

Does California want to be a grasshopper that uses everything it has, or an ant that saves food for winter? That was the question posed today by Gov. Jerry Brown as he released his May budget revision. Not surprisingly, Brown made the case for being a frugal ant.

He has adjusted his revenue forecast down $1.9 billion since his initial January budget proposal. Most of that was absorbed through lower contributions to the state's reserve, meaning there were no budget cuts.

Brown says history shows California is overdue for an economic downturn. That led him to reject many of the spending requests sent to him by lawmakers.

“The hard truth is that we have committed the available funds," he says. "So the only way you can envision large new spending programs is to ignore the history of how revenues rise and fall.”

Brown says even if voters approve an extension of Proposition 30 income taxes in November, the budget will remain barely balanced. Without an extension, he says cuts will have to be made. Brown's administration predicts, if nothing else changes, that the state will have a $4 billion deficit by the 2019-2020 budget cycle.

Nonetheless, Brown declined to endorse that fall ballot measure to extend those taxes.

Brown reminded the media what happened to his two predecessors, Democrat Gray Davis and Republican Arnold Schwarzenegger. The governor noted that both ignored warnings that revenues were about to fall and instead accelerated spending.

"Paradoxically, at the very moment when everybody feels the best is the moment just before the recession is about to hit," he says. "Instead of pulling back in the last two recessions, the state of California accelerated its spending and therefore made the budget cuts all the more painful."

Then "it was bye-bye Davis ... and bye-bye Arnold," Brown said, referring to Davis' recall and Schwarzenegger's falling popularity as he left office. "Now is it bye-bye Jerry? Not if I can help it," Brown joked.

But the governor's cautious tone was not well received by many lawmakers and social service advocates arguing for a restoration of funds that were cut in the last recession. Sen. Hannah-Beth Jackson chairs the Legislative Women's Caucus, which had requested $800 million to fund child care.

"It’s fitting that Governor Brown included a children’s story in his release of the May Revise today," she said in a statement, "because the California Legislative Women’s Caucus has been and remains committed to prioritizing a strong investment in early care and education so children can learn and parents can work."

Senate leader Kevin de León was one of the few lawmakers to have his budget priority included in Brown's plan. It would allow funds dedicated to treating mental illness to also be used to fight homelessness.

“Homelessness plagues communities across our state so I’m very pleased Governor Brown has embraced the Senate’s bipartisan ‘No Place Like Home’ proposal to direct $2 billion from the Prop. 63 bond to bolster local efforts to tackle this crisis," de León said in a statement.

Republicans appreciated Brown's message of saving for a rainy day. But Republican Senate leader Jean Fuller points out the state isn't exactly holding back on spending this budget cycle.

"This is the highest general fund budget that we've ever had," she says.

The general fund budget would be $122.2 billion under Brown's proposal, a 5.7 percent increase from the current year.