This morning the Assembly Republicans presented a budget roadmap that contained no new taxes, funds education at its current level and requires government to help balance the budget by reducing state employee costs.
The six-point plan was formally presented to Assembly Speaker John Perez in a letter from Minority Leader Connie Conway. You can read the letter here. You can read more from Conway in her Flash Report column here.
A take on the plan from Kevin Yamamura of the Sacramento Bee is here. He points out that some features of the plan would require voter approval to move special funds to the general fund that voters rejected in the past.
The plan will certainly engage the debate on the tax proposals that have stalled in the legislature. The Republican plan relies on a boost of unanticipated revenues that have been recently acknowledged and expectations that revenues will continue to increase over the next fiscal year.
A no tax budget plan will give the economy a chance to grow even quicker and, in turn, very likely grow the amount of revenue that is forecast in the current budget scenario. The proposal is a good addition to the current debate on state finances.
We’ll have more on the Republican plan and the Governor’s May budget revision in the coming days.