THAT’S DEBATABLE:What are your budget plans?

California legislators missed their Friday deadline to adopt a budget for next year in part because Democrats oppose some cuts suggested by Gov. Schwarzenegger, and Republicans have said the budget simply spends too much. As talks continue, what areas are you targeting to reduce spending, and what will it take to get you to vote for a budget?

In state budgets, timeliness is highly overrated — I prefer a good, late budget to a bad, on-time budget.

Gov. Schwarzenegger’s budget proposes to spend about $2.5 billion more than the tax money the state will receive over the next year. The Democrats want to spend over $3 billion more than we are projected to receive in taxes. Both budget proposals represent the seventh year of deficit spending.

In fact, the average rate of budget growth under Gov. Schwarzenegger has been 8.1% as compared to 7.1% under Gov. Davis and 4.8% percent under Gov. Wilson.

If we simply restrain the rate of budget growth to an average of 5% per year, revenue will quickly catch up to spending and we can pay down our mounting debt.

I will not vote for any budget that grows faster than the taxpayers’ ability to pay for it, nor will I support a budget that grows debt.

CHUCK DEVORE

One of the major contributors to the budget stalemate is best portrayed by the Senate Appropriations Committee’s action last month to add more than $8 billion of new state spending for new programs this year. This is at a time when our tax receipts have hit a revenue wall and will result in a projected $3.6 billion deficit for the current year. Simply stated, we are spending more than we take in.

It is outrageous that state spending over the last four years has grown 40%. In addition to that, the state has a maxed-out credit card debt in the form of $92.6 billion in bond indebtedness. And finally, the state has ignored any type of responsible planning for funding its retirement and health-care obligations for retired employees. That amounts to another $70 billion. The Democrats’ new spending proposals are akin to the sinking of the Titanic — California’s bank account is drowning in red ink.

Before I will support any budget proposal, the state must reform the mismanagement of state expenditures that exist within our state bureaucracies and make them more accountable. We must not allow the rate of state spending to exceed the growth of population and inflation combined.

We must institute zero-based budgeting so that every state agency must account for every dollar they spend. Our state welfare system must discourage abuse and encourage self-reliance. We need to stop subsidizing illegal immigrants by removing the incentives that draw them to our county in the first place.

I will not support any budget proposal until appropriate steps are taken to force the state to stop squandering the dollars it take from hardworking Californians. Likewise, I will not support any budget proposal that balances the budget by raising taxes.

TOM HARMAN

Although I wish the legislature had met the Constitutional deadline and approved a budget on time, it is much more important that we have a responsible budget for California. While revenues have reached historic heights, spending has continued to skyrocket at an untenable rate the last few years.

I would like to see a budget that eliminates ongoing deficits now, not continue pushing them off into the future. Analysts agree the economy is softening and the state can’t count on continued growth at the same rate we’ve seen the past three years. If we don’t cut spending now, those decisions will only be more difficult in the future.

VAN TRAN