Be sure to wear a flower in your hairThis week has seen California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger scrounging for a few billion dollars beneath the sofa cushions after his stop-gap measures for narrowing the state's budget shortfall went down to defeat in Tuesday's special election. Among the consequences of the election results, which necessitate immediate cuts to state services across the board, could be the release of up to 40,000 inmates from California prisons. Schwarzenegger has proposed transf
Photobucket.comTo put a new twist on an old saw, desperation is often the mother of invention. When a person, or a state, is in dire straits, it's often an opportunity for the kind of epochal change that, at other times, might not be considered.That's where we are right now with marijuana law reform in California, thanks to the state budget crisis and its attendant desperate search for tax revenue. Backers of the Control, Regulate and Tax Cannabis Act of 2010, the first major statewide initiativ
Is it game over for the state's narcotics officers? California's budget crunch could cut almost a third of the agents from the Bureau of Narcotics Enforcement, according to Attorney General Jerry Brown.Budget negotiators, facing the financial meltdown of the state treasury, have proposed lopping $20 million from the bureau, on top of $12 million in previous cuts. Brown called it a "terrible budgetary decision" that would lead to layoffs for nearly a third of the BNE's agents.The agency, part of
Cutting billions from health and education while 'borrowing' from local governments -- the California dream!Some of the haziness surrounding the state's tentative budget deal will burn off this morning, as party leaders have scheduled 9 a.m. caucuses to outline the finer points of a plan that promises not to thrill anyone.The broader strokes of the pact to stave off California's $26.3 billion shortfall were published late yesterday. Perhaps most concerning to those fortunate enough not to rely o
But how bad will it be?With Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger expected to sign a somewhat modified state budget today, just how badly San Francisco will make out is still as clear as a pint of Guinness. But there'll be no good news delivered today and for the rest of this week -- only relatively good news (something akin to the doctor telling you "this is treatable -- and most people go on to live fairly normal lives"). We reported yesterday that the state hopes to snatch $28.7 million from our loca
Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger today signed a state budget that will cut roughly $82.1 million from the state's Office of AIDS, says that office's chief, Dr. Michelle Roland. The state cuts promise to disproportionately hit cities like San Francisco, which is among the nation's top 20 counties when it comes to AIDS and HIV prevalence, according to the online HIV/AIDS Atlas provided by the National Minority Quality Forum.
Courtney Mulhern-Pearson of the San Francisco AIDS Found
In the print edition of today's SF Weekly, we reported on the saga of Nedar Bey, the controversial lighting contractor who may or may not cost BART hundreds of thousands of dollars in state grants. The story is complex, but here it is in the tiniest possible nutshell: Last month, Nedar Bey was awarded a portion of a state-funded lighting project worth up to $3.2 million by the BART board. Per the state's regulations, all contracts had to be signed by Oct. 31, or the grant money earmarked for
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