CA: Senate to critique Schwarzenegger reorganization plan

Bakersfield Californian ^ | 1/3/05 | Don Thompson - AP

[NormsRevenge]

SACRAMENTO (AP) - Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger should cooperate with state lawmakers to fine-tune his government reorganization plan and not try to impose it unilaterally, two new Senate leaders warned Monday as lawmakers returned to work for the new year.

Sen. Liz Figueroa, D-Sunol, will chair a new Government Modernization, Efficiency and Accountability Committee that will review Schwarzenegger's 2,500-page California Performance Review plan. She also will represent the Senate on the Little Hoover Commission, the government watchdog that could consider the plan.

Figueroa called the review "an imaginative and courageous effort," but questioned whether Schwarzenegger's ultimate recommendations will bring the promised savings.

"Show me the money," Figueroa said, promising a hearing on that topic.

Schwarzenegger said the recommendations would save $32 billion over five years. But the Legislature's chief budget analyst's estimate was $15 billion, and the Little Hoover Commission said reorganizations rarely reduce government costs significantly.

Figueroa also criticized a proposal to shift responsibilities from governor-appointed boards and commissions to agencies also controlled by the governor.

"Shifting boxes is not 'blowing up the boxes'" as Schwarzenegger had promised, Figueroa said. "Don't propose phony reform and try to sell it to us as real reform."

Schwarzenegger spokeswoman Margita Thompson said the governor wants to work with lawmakers on state government issues, "but it's unfortunate it was a partisan tone in the first few hours of the Legislature returning. The lesson of the recall (election) was that we need to put partisanship aside."

Thompson wouldn't say if the governor would accept legislative changes to the recommendations he will outline in Wednesday's State of the State address. But she said lawmakers already had a chance to influence the recommendations during eight public hearings conducted by a 21-member governor's commission that also included some legislators.

That commission submitted a 12-page report in November that avoided comment on controversial recommendations because commissioners couldn't reach consensus. Senate President Pro Tem Don Perata and Figueroa criticized commissioners for not listening to enough unaffiliated citizens, something Figueroa said will be corrected at a series of Senate hearings.

Along with announcing his recommendations Wednesday, some of Schwarzenegger's proposals already have been enacted through executive orders, or could be in the budget or introduced as legislation, Thompson said.

Schwarzenegger alternately could force an up-or-down vote on the phonebook-thick review. But Figueroa advised the Republican governor to "reject all the cynical games" and temptation to use that method to set up the review as a political bludgeon against the Democrat-controlled Legislature.

Figueroa and Perata, D-Oakland, said the governor and Legislature should work cooperatively to improve the review's recommendations. Perata said he created the committee to give Schwarzenegger's proposals "priority attention."

Caltrans needs reform, two-dozen or more school districts face possible bankruptcy, and it is too difficult to enroll in the Healthy Families program, Perata said, suggesting areas the review also should address.

Figueroa suggested the state should post polluters and their punishments on the Internet and let small businesses check the status of permits online, among the "revolutionary" changes she would like to see.

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On the Net:

Read the California Performance Review report online at http://www.cpr.ca.gov

Little Hoover Commission: http://www.lhc.ca.gov

[PRND21]

Caltrans needs reform, two-dozen or more school districts face possible bankruptcy,
and it is too difficult to enroll in the Healthy Families program

Go Liberalism Go

[NormsRevenge]

Yup, The liberals pile of 'successes' just gets bigger and bigger. ;-)