Budget and Finance

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State's Ongoing Nutty Budget Battle

The following first appeared in the City Journal California. JUNE 20, 2011 By STEVEN GREENHUT Watching the California budget drama unfold reminds me of the “Seinfeld” episode in which George Costanza pretends he has to sign papers on a house he’s leasing

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Prop. 13 Split Roll Would Be Ripoff

JUNE 20, 2011 By WAYNE LUSVARDI and CHARLES B. WARREN Democrats in the California Legislature want to repeal the property tax reassessment protections of Proposition 13 for commercial properties under the dubious notion that there is a pot of California

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Redevelopment Agencies on the Brink

JUNE 20, 2011 By STEVEN GREENHUT Hours before the midnight Wednesday deadline for passing a state budget, legislative Democrats rammed through a ridiculous, gimmick-laden, majority-vote spending plan that failed to reform anything and failed to impress Gov. Jerry Brown, who

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The Paycheck Protection Budget

JUNE 17, 2011 The California Legislature just passed a budget. Less than 24 hours later, the governor vetoed it, leaving many political wonks scratching their heads in wonderment at why Gov. Jerry Brown vetoed a budget from his own party.

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Chapman CA Forecast Warns Legislature

JUNE 16, 2011 By JOHN SEILER This morning, Gov. Jerry Brown vetoed the budget passed yesterday by the Democratic-run California Legislature. Even as he was doing so, Chapman University was revealing a sobering economic forecast that should make the Legislature

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Dem majority passes 'scapegoat' budget

JUNE 15, 2011 By KATY GRIMES For the first time since 1933, Democrats passed the state budget, without Republican support, and using only a majority vote. Lawmakers may have met the constitutional deadline of June 15 as ordered by California

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CA GOP Shouldn't 'Go Wobbly' on Taxes

JUNE 16, 2011 I met Margaret Thatcher, the former British Prime Minister, back in 1993 on a visit she made to California to promote her memoir. I remember her talking about the first Gulf War and how she overcame the

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Bonds Could Sink Split-Roll Tax Increase

JUNE 15, 2011 By WAYNE LUSVARDI California’s convoluted finances, ironically, could preclude a split-roll property tax increase. Such a tax increase would alter Proposition 13 to keep property taxes on homes the same (allowing increases of just 2 percent a

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Brown Debt Gimmicks 'Balance' Budget

JUNE 14, 2011 By WAYNE LUSVARDI Most knowledgeable people realize that California’s debt emperor has no clothes. Even if the mainstream newspaper media continue to clothe the emperor in the robes of an all-wise Buddhist monk who has taken a

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Budget For A Paycheck?

JUNE 14, 2011 By KATY GRIMES Commentary If you were presented with doing your job or having your paycheck withheld, what would you do? Oh wait – that is how it works for private sector employment. Fortunately, legislators are also

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