Robbing Peter To Pay Ahnold

Via Atrios and CalcRisk, this article from the Orange County Register shows just how bad of a problem the Governator's budget plan is, taking money allocated to California's cities to fund the state may in fact bankrupt the cities.

Placentia city officials are howling in effort to keep state hands out of their coffers. The plan to seize millions could bankrupt the city, they say.

"We may have to declare bankruptcy – that's how serious this is," said City Administrator Troy Butzlaff. "This is something the system can't endure. We just avoided bankruptcy by doing all the right things; by cutting back, by getting concessions from staff, by cutting $4.5 million over last year's budget."

As the new state budget bills approach a vote by the legislature, the city is urging residents to print and clip out "deficit dollars" posted on placentia.org, the city's Web site, and send them to Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger in protest of plans to hijack what would amount to $2.5 million from local coffers.

In a release, city officials called the funds grab "stealing" and argued it was unconstitutional.

Placentia was just extricating itself financially from a massive boondoggle, paying down and reorganizing millions in debt from the failed road-rail separation project called OnTrac.

"We were seeing light at the end of the tunnel," Butzlaff said. "Six fiscal years have gone by, and this was the first time we've had a balanced budget."

Placentia City Councilwoman Connie Underhill said she hoped a grassroots protest effort would mean more to legislators than the complaints of city officials.

"I think that maybe just having council members and city managers approaching legislators doesn't seem to be doing too much," she said. "Maybe if they heard from the residents, it'd make more of a difference. These are the people who will really be affected by this."

Butzlaff said earlier this week the state legislators' budget proposals could take roughly $900,000 from gas tax money, $800,000 from property tax money, and $400,000 from the Redevelopment Agency.

At some point, we're going to see these cities and counties start suing the state over this, and I'm betting it's coming sooner rather than later. Thousands of local government employees are going to have to be laid off, city and county services will cease to exist, and it's going to make several already hard hit areas with double digit unemployment like the Inland Empire that much more unliveable.

Revenue is going to leave, and it's not going to come back. The people who have to stay because they can't afford to leave are the ones that are going to really hurt. Think Ninth Ward, New Orleans, only spread over the entire state.

It angers me that the GOP continually wants to be in charge of government when they hate government and governing so very much. It angers me more that the state's Democrats go along with it.