Looking at the current budget crisis as a chance to make more sweeping changes, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger again is pushing a plan to reorganize state government.
Posted on 01/02/2009 11:52:57 AM PST by SmithL
Heeding the maxim that there is opportunity in crisis, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has trotted out a new, albeit much smaller, version of his 2004 "blow up the boxes" government reorganization plan.
The 2009 version is part of the labyrinthine $40 billion state budget-fixing proposal the administration released Wednesday.
Included in the voluminous scheme are 17 proposals to combine, cut or realign various boards, commissions and programs, including:
• Consolidating the state Hearing Aid Dispensers Bureau with the Speech-Language Pathology and Audiology Board.
• Combining the state boards of geologists and geophysicists into one entity representing the interests of scientific disciplines that begin with the "geo" prefix.
• Leaving it up to local school districts, rather than the state, to issue work permits to child actors.
All of these ideas, according to Schwarzenegger administration officials, represent "an opportunity for state government to increase efficiency, spend less and eliminate duplication and functions that are not absolutely critical."
They also represent a much more modest version of the governor's efforts five years ago to reshape state government.
In 2004, a 275-member task force put together a 2,500-page report that recommended eliminating 12,000 state jobs and hundreds of appointed positions to save the state an estimated $32 billion over five years.
But the nonpartisan Legislative Analyst's Office estimated total savings at less than half the $32 billion. And legislative resistance, opposition from vested interests such as state employee unions and sheer bureaucratic inertia kept most of the recommendations from being adopted.
(Excerpt) Read more at sacbee.com ...
There's a state Hearing Aid Dispensers Bureau? Sounds Sovietastic.
I'm STILL waiting on the real thing!
These seem like extremely modest proposals. Hard to imagine that they would save much.
However, sadly, they may be the only ones with even a slight chance of getting through the dysfunctional legislature. Pity we can’t recall the whole lot of them.
Arnold is the consummate RINO and the biggest disappointment in politics.
This budget crisis is a shining example of conservative philosophy that government should not only be small, and affordable, but forever be agile enough to get off the taxpayers back when the economy is stumbling.
Arnold has been an extreme disappointment!
He could make a lot of money by making crime pay. That is, for a whole range of crimes, instead of paying for criminals to be incarcerated, make them pay money instead.
On conviction of a whole bunch of criminal acts, include administrative fines for anyone with the capacity to pay, so that they can really pay their debt to society.
What could be more popular than a “morality tax” on the rich? I bet it would be a hit with the typical Californian.
But... but... but... that would discrimate against the poor!
Not really, because they are losing nothing in the deal. Only the people with money are the ones administratively taxed. And it’s a progressive tax, which they should love as well.
For example, if you are poor and DUI, you get the normal penalty. But if you are middle class, you also get socked with a $5,000 tax. And if you are wealthy, it could cost you $50,000 or $500,000
You know how they say, “With great power comes great responsibility”? Well, in this case, they might say, “With wealth and abuse of the law, comes a big honking administrative fine.”
And you’d be right, once again!!!
I hope you haven't been holding your breath...
After Americans elected & reelected the three-time draft dodger, Clinton, Californians elected & reelected the lying liberal Schwarzenegger and elected a clown POTUS who spent 20 years of his life attending weekly anti-American racist diatribes by “Rev. Wrong” and who has spent close to a million dollars fighting legal challenges rather than spend $12.50 for a valid birth certificate; I've completely given up on the American electorate. This Marine is "Gone Fishing!"
Happy New Year!
.. and the other time was when I said that Democratic Party moles run the California Republican Party? :)
Just maybe they run the RNC as well, I'm still wondering . . . .
You are certainly not alone on that!!!
Any time I read that something will "save/cost X dollars over N years," where N is greater than 1, I'm pretty sure that either creative accounting or number inflation is involved. If you can't or won't say that it'll cost X dollars per year, it means you either don't know or that you think that X isn't going to be perceived as a very attractive figure.
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