I’d like to apologize for the $6 billion hole that’s already opened up in this year’s state budget.
I made the hole.
But I didn’t do it alone. I had help from a few friends. You may know them as the voters of California.
We made this hole together last year. Remember it? The hole was created back in May 2009, so long ago that Meg Whitman and Nicky Diaz Santillan were still family.
That month, the voters of California faced six ballot measures as part of a special election. The election had to be called to bless five pieces of a February 2009 budget deal that involved either constitutional changes or changes to programs like the lottery that were established by ballot initiative. (In California, when you change a voter-approved measure, you gotta ask the voters permission). Those pieces involved tweaks worth $6 billion in budget savings.
The February 2009 deal was full of things people could hate. Big spending cuts. Temporary tax increases. A tax cut for corporations (at the time that programs were being cut and taxes on individuals were being raised). And so voters hated it.
We voted down the five ballot measures. In doing so, we voters blew a $6 billion hole in the budget. We did this all by ourselves. This hole wasn’t the governor’s fault. It wasn’t the legislature’s fault. It wasn’t San Andreas Fault.
It was our fault.
And we haven’t done anything to patch up the hole since. We’ve effectively rolled it over from one year to another. (Not to mention that fact that voters blew another $2 billion hole in the budget with their votes Prop 22 and Prop 26 this month. I won’t apologize for that, however – I realized I was part of the problem and decided not to vote this fall).
So the $6 billion hole is still with us. Sorry. I’m sure all the voters out there will want to join my apology. Because Californians surely wouldn’t seek to blame others for their own budget irresponsibility. Right?