CA: State budget's final hurdles hardest to clear

Bakersfield Californian ^ | 7/16/04 | Tom Chorneau - AP

[NormsRevenge]

SACRAMENTO (AP) - As the rest of California watches the ongoing battle over the state budget with some detachment, Jill Marchuk has a far more vital stake in how the final issues play out - her job as a transportation clerk with the Folsom Cordova school district. Now 17 days late, the budget has been stalled over differences between Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and the Legislature's Democratic majority on three key issues, including a 2002 law that largely prohibits schools from hiring private companies to operate district bus systems and perform groundskeeping and janitorial duties.

They're also at odds over a law signed in October that gives workers the right to file civil lawsuits against their employers for labor code violations and over rival proposals for protecting local government financing from the state. While everyone seems to agree that local tax money should be kept local, there is no agreement on how best to protect cities and counties from future state raids.

Repealing the school contract law, Schwarzenegger and Republican lawmakers say, would save hundreds of millions of dollars for textbooks and education services.

Democrats, led by Assembly Speaker Fabian Nunez of Los Angeles, argue that workers will lose wages and benefits while there's no guarantee that any money would be saved.

"Taking away this law is not going to benefit Californians," said Marchuk, 41, who earns $14 an hour processing payments and bills for the district's bus service. "The only thing standing between my district and contracting our jobs out is Senate Bill 1419."

But school officials say they have a very real problem making do year in and year out with less.

Debbie Bettencourt, deputy superintendent of Folsom Cordova Unified School District, said over the past four years they've had to cut $12 million from out of a $100 million budget. "We are cutting student services including reading programs. We've looked in every area of our operation to see if we can do things more efficiently."

By hiring a private transportation firm, Laidlaw Education Services, to handle the district's bus route, Bettencourt said they could save about $700,000 a year. But the district can't work out a contract with Laidlaw because of the law's requirements, including that the private contract not undercut school district pay rates or cost the jobs of current district employees.

"I think removing this law provides schools with the flexibility to provide services in the most appropriate way," Bettencourt said.

Also hanging up a budget agreement is another little-known law, SB 796, that allows workers to take their employers to court over labor code violations.

Schwarzenegger said the law allows frivolous lawsuits and needs to go, while Democrats said it protects workers from dangerous working conditions at a time when there are far too few state regulators.

Signed into law as one of the last acts of former Gov. Gray Davis before the recall election, it has become a huge issue for business groups including the California Chamber of Commerce.

Even the law's author, Sen. Joe Dunn, D-Santa Ana, said he's surprised Davis signed it. The former governor overruled his staff's advice, Dunn said, because of his concerns the state lacked the resources to do the necessary work place inspections.

But Republican Assembly leader Kevin McCarthy of Bakersfield calls the law an open invitation to disgruntled workers to sue their bosses. He points out there's even a guidebook on the market advising workers how to use the new law.

While the party lines may be sharply drawn around the school contracting issue, Dunn said he has already been in negotiations with the administration over how to improve his law and introduced a follow-up bill in January, SB 1809, intended to limit the issues that workers for which could file lawsuits.

"I've always said that I was going to be the biggest critic of frivolous lawsuits," said Dunn, who added that he would not abandon the protections needed.

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On the Net

Gov.'s home page: http://www.governor.ca.gov/state/govsite/gov-homepage.jsp

http://www.sen.ca.gov/

California Senate

http://www.assembly.ca.gov/acs/defaulttext.asp

California Assembly

[Viet-Boat-Rider]

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

The LA Times says Arnold is getting angry!

Good!

[goldstategop]

I noticed the guy making $14 an hour processing payments. You know, its one of those jobs that could be outsourced. The point I'm getting at with all those cushy union jobs protected by law, its the childrun who come last. They should come first. But to hear from Assembly Speaker Fabian Nunez, the unions should always have first bat in the way public education dollars are spent. I gotta tell y'all, I love this. The Democrats always say how important kids are and here they are telling them to go take a hike. Amazing.