Senate Republican Leader Bob Dutton issued the following statement today in response to Governor Brown's 12-Point Pension Reform Plan:

Senate Republicans have been clear for months that public employee pension reform is a critical element required to reach a budget agreement. The governor heard it from the entire Senate Republican Caucus when he spoke to us on December 7, 2010, and again on February 9, 2011.

Senate Republicans believe that this is an achievable objective based on the public's strong support for public employee pension reform and what we had heard from then-candidate Jerry Brown. ...

According to a March 2011 PPIC Poll, most likely voters statewide agree the cost of public pensions is a big problem: 57 percent believe state government should decrease state pension plans to help balance the budget; 71 percent support a 401K-style pension plan for government employees; 56 percent of government employees support a 401K-style pension plan for new workers. [READ MORE]

Sacramento – Senate Republican Leader Bob Dutton (Rancho Cucamonga) issued the following statement in response to Governor Brown halting budget negotiations:

The governor and legislative Democrats are obviously upset and lashing out at their inability to get buyoff from public employee unions for the reforms that the public supports and Republicans think are necessary to fix California.

The governor pledged to have all taxes go to a vote of the people, and corporate tax increases are not in “the fine print” of his campaign pledge, as far as we know. Republicans believe the people deserve the right to vote on issues such as reforming the unsustainable public employee pension system and placing constitutional restraints on state spending growth, in addition to taxes.

Our positions on those issues are remarkably similar to the positions that then-candidate Jerry Brown championed during last year’s campaign that returned him to the Governor’s Office.

While compromise is needed to avoid an all-cuts budget, it involves more than the Republicans going along with the first, last and only solution of higher taxes offered by the Majority Party during this budget debate.

Senate Republicans are committed to solving the state’s long-standing budget crisis and helping to get Californians back to work.

Sacramento – Senate Republican Leader Bob Dutton (Rancho Cucamonga) issued the following statement today on the Democrats’ response to the Senate Republican budget solutions presented to Governor Brown on Friday:

The Democrats’ response to the Senate Republicans’ budget solutions proves that they were never serious about a true bipartisan budget, but instead are only interested in Republicans giving in to their demands for more taxes.

Democrats ignored all Republican input during the public budget committee process. The Democrats’ budget is over 700 pages long. The fact that Republicans would seek some small, but important changes, in addition to necessary reforms that will fix California's long term budget problem, should come as no surprise to anyone who has experience negotiating a budget agreement.

Republicans believe long-term solutions are necessary to end the state’s chronic budget deficit and to get people back to work. Republicans are asking to let the people vote on a hard spending cap and pension reform.

Democrats have full control of state government and could enact a budget without Republicans. Republicans have a right to participate since voters elected us, as well.

Sacramento - Senate Republican Leader Bob Dutton (Rancho Cucamonga) responded today to Senate President pro Tempore Darrell Steinberg's representation that the budget being voted on Wednesday "responsibly and honestly promises to put California's fiscal crisis behind us once and for all."

"The simple truth is, the budget the Senate Democrats are putting up for a vote on Wednesday is not a balanced plan," said Dutton. "It is just another short-sighted tax-and-spend scheme that relies on a $50 billion bailout from California taxpayers. It does nothing to fix the state's budget crisis or put Californians back to work. The Democrats say, "Let the people vote," but what the Democrats really want is for the people to pay for government as usual."

The Democrats' budget proposal is not half cuts/half taxes:

• $50 billion in total tax increases over 5 years
• $26 billion in extra spending over 3 years
• $14 billion in tax hikes this year
• $7 billion in cuts
• $7.5 billion in gimmicks

The Democrats' budget proposal has no long-term solutions:

• No plan to put people back to work
• No pension reform
• No spending cap
• No change to government as usual

By Michael B. Marois - Mar 11, 2011
Governor Jerry Brown’s proposed $12.5 billion in budget cuts won’t prevent California’s spending from increasing 31 percent during the next five years, according to figures from his budget office….

“While we must bridge this year’s budget gap, we must also rein-in future spending to fix the state’s chronic budget crisis," said Senate Republican Leader Bob Dutton…

Even with an austerity budget that Brown called “painful,” spending will increase $26 billion by 2015, according to state projections. At the same time, he’s asking voters to pay more than $46 billion of higher taxes and fees.

... Read the entire article.

The Governor has projected a General Fund budget deficit of $25.4 billion ($8.2 billion in 2010-11 and $17.2 billion in 2011-12). This is the same as the Legislative Analyst’s November 2010 estimate of $25.4 billion (a $6.1 billion projected deficit for 2010-11 and a $19.3 billion gap between projected revenues and spending in 2011-12) though it is arrived at through a different methodology.

Governor Brown proposes $26.4 billion in solutions ($25.4 billion problem plus $1 billion reserve) that include $12.5 billion of Expenditure Reductions, $12 billion in Revenues, and $1.9 billion of Other (primarily one-time special fund loans and transfers). However, it appears that about $4.6 billion of "Expenditure Reductions" are actually from "Fund Shifts" such as redirecting Redevelopment Agency ($1.7 billion), Proposition 10 and 63 revenues ($1.9 billion), and Transportation Weight Fees ($1.0 billion). In addition, the "Revenues" are actually $14 billion ($13.8 billion of tax increases), but cleverly offset by a negative $2 billion adjustment to reflect Proposition 98 interaction (i.e., the Proposition 98 share of new tax revenue).

An honest accounting would reflect $28.4 billion of solutions ($27.4 billion problem plus $1 billion reserve) with $8 billion of Expenditure Reductions, $14 billion of Revenue, and $6.4 billion of Other - not quite the "balanced" approach promoted by the Governor.

Read complete analysis (58-page pdf)