Do California legislators think the state pays its bills with
Monopoly money? Do they think cash grows on trees? Reports that
legislators recently gave every state Senate employee a 5 percent
pay hike and that spending on legislative staff payroll is soaring
are nothing short of stunning.
Do California legislators think the state pays its bills with Monopoly money? Do they think cash grows on trees?
Reports that legislators recently gave every state Senate employee a 5 percent pay hike and that spending on legislative staff payroll is soaring are nothing short of stunning.
While Gilroy ponders radical cuts to its recreation programs and police and fire services due to the state budget crisis, just a handful of state legislators are offering to take a pay cut.
Even as the Morgan Hill Unified School District issued layoff notices to 111.5 teachers due to slashing state education cuts, legislative aides – many of whom earn six-figure salaries paid for with tax dollars – were receiving hefty salary increases.
Legislators may not be able to see the link between increasing spending and increasing budget woes, but voters certainly can.
Outrageous doesn’t even begin to describe legislators’ lack of fiscal self-control.
It should be no wonder, then, that Californians’ confidence in the ability of state leaders to fix the $35 billion budget gap is lower than a pregnant snake’s belly in a wagon rut.
The recently released Field Poll showed that 42 percent of Californians surveyed have “not much confidence” that the state legislature would do the right thing to solve the budget crisis. And depressingly few – 7 percent – report that they have “great confidence” in their state legislators.
We urge state legislators and South Valley voters to remember Secretary of State Colin Powell’s wise words: “Leadership is solving problems.”
The state of California is facing an urgent $35 billion problem. Their behavior – spending more money on their own staff while forcing others to suffer slashing funding cuts – should be an embarrassment and a disgrace.
We urge South Valley residents to communicate in blunt terms with our state representatives and Gov. Gray Davis about their mishandling of the state budget crisis. And if our elected representatives don’t dramatically improve – immediately – voters have a duty to remember that when legislators seek re-election.
If they don’t work for us, boot ‘em out come election day.
