SACRAMENTO — Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger on Tuesday sent lawmakers his plan to trim more than $5 billion in spending by dismantling or drastically curtailing state programs that provide Californians with healthcare, higher education, welfare, parks, AIDS treatment and counseling, prisoner rehabilitation and other services.
The cuts came atop other severe spending reductions in a separate $16-billion plan that the governor unveiled two weeks ago. His aides said he would propose another $3 billion in cuts by the end of the week to address a projected $24.3-billion budget shortfall.
Opponents of the proposed reductions mobilized throughout the day around the Capitol, which sprang to life again after a long holiday weekend.
Union members began a 48-hour vigil in the park that surrounds the statehouse, saying that their members would be driven into poverty, and the elderly and disabled deprived of care if Schwarzenegger's proposals are adopted. They also filed a lawsuit in federal court that attempts to stop some of the planned cuts.
Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa came to the capital along with other officials to denounce Schwarzenegger's bid to borrow $2 billion from local governments. The League of California Cities launched a website, "Save Your City," asking for videos that will show how a state "raid" of local property taxes would affect people throughout the state. "Your city is in trouble," the site flashed.
Meanwhile, lawmakers inside the Capitol debated Schwarzenegger's plans in the gravest of tones.
"It shocks the conscience that we have to throw sick children off of welfare to satisfy Wall Street," said Assemblywoman Noreen Evans (D-Santa Rosa), the budget committee chairwoman. She added: "This used to be the Golden State, and now it is a sorry state and it is not my California."
Others, including Assemblyman Roger Niello (R-Fair Oaks), said the state must face the situation as it is. "We are being driven by an economy that has absolutely collapsed," said Niello, the committee's vice chairman. "This is nobody's vision of where we wanted to be."
The governor, who has said that voters demanded the reductions by rejecting a slate of ballot measures last week that would have raised $5.8 billion to fill the budget gap, taped an appearance Tuesday on "The Tonight Show With Jay Leno" for the departing host. Earlier, he had told a group of small-business leaders in Sacramento that the state would "face catastrophic consequences" -- the government could become insolvent -- unless he and lawmakers dramatically scaled back state programs.
