Cuts in healthcare, children's aid

Two-thirds of participants in Healthy Families would be hit with premium increases. The program provides medical coverage for children of more than 800,000 low-income parents who earn more than the poverty level.

Medi-Cal patients would lose coverage for dental work and optometry. Schwarzenegger's reductions also include cutting $720.9 million in payments for doctors and hospitals that accept Medi-Cal. That would amount to a 10% cut in rates that are already among the lowest in the nation, and could lead many doctors to refuse to accept those patients.

The average foster care grant received by family caregivers would drop from $715 a child per month to $644 per month.

Schwarzenegger also proposed $198 million in cuts to child development programs and $59 million for before- and after-school programs that had been set up through an initiative Schwarzenegger championed before he ran for governor.

The governor's budget would also mean that 620 poor elderly people would no longer receive meals from the state, and 30,000 more would be denied $20 worth of free produce from farmers' markets each year.

As he has in past years, Schwarzenegger proposed cutting $462 million from the state's welfare program, CalWORKS, by toughening eligibility rules. About 70,200 families receiving aid for more than five years would lose grants for their children if the parents did not adhere to federal work participation requirements.

Anthony Wright, executive director of Health Access California, a consumer group, said Schwarzenegger's "budget actually exacerbates the problems" that the governor spent most of last year trying to solve.

However, Kimberly Belshe, Schwarzenegger health and human services secretary, said the state's health programs would still provide a strong "foundation" to expand healthcare as the governor intends.