Sacramento Gray Panthers and California Gray Panthers

Legislative Issues/MEDIC: Jim Dawson
PO Box 7138
Torrence, CA 90504
310-217-9202
jrdawson@earthlink.net

Outreach/New Chapters: Margot Smith
1403 Addison Street
Berkeley, CA 94702
510-548-9696
graypanthersberk@aol.com

Autumn Quarterly Meeting

Gray Panthers California

Our next Gray Panther Quarterly statewide Meeting was held at

Lifelong Medical Care,
2031 Sixth Street, Berkeley
Saturday, January 23rd, 2010
from 10 AM to 3 PM.

Many thanks,

Margot Smith
Berkeley-East Bay Gray Panthers
1403 Addison Street
Berkeley, CA 94702
510-548-9696
FAX 510-548-9697
GrayPanthersBerk@aol.com
I urge each network to participate and I hope to see many of you there!

Statements on the dismal state budget and the Governors's additional vetoes:

At the August 17-18 CCS (Congress of California Seniors) convention (www.seniors.org), attendees including Gray Panthers members Betty Perry, Ruth Kletzing, and Margie Metzler watched tributes to Assembly member Mike Feuer and supportive talks by Assembly members Dave Jones, Bonnie Lowenthal, Mariko Yamada, and Hector DeLaTorre, and Senator Elaine Alquist (who told us she is engaged to be married!) The bulk of the sessions were about the latest budget and its consequences for seniors. The following is information from CCS:

After weeks of debate and for the third time in a year, the Legislature passed and the Governor signed a revised state budget for 2009-2010. the final budget represents a massive reduction in revenues available for vital state services. The declining revenues resulted from the sharp economic decline, job layoffs, and dropping residential property values. It also follows several years of borrowing, fund shifts and other actions which masked an on-going revenue shortfall. The deficits in the past two budgets total a record $62 billion.

Senior services are hit very hard with some of the largest program cuts in over 30 years being made to get to a balanced budget that meets minority party demands for no tax increases. The newly revised budget has been cut by $23 billion dollars with over $15 billion of that coming in cuts to programs. Most of the large cuts were passed buy the legislative Budget Conference Committee in June after the Governor proposed the wholesale elimination of nearly all programs protecting seniors. In signing the budget, the Governor made additional cuts of $489 million in health and human services programs.

The Governor's budget also cut IHSS service claiming a 25% rate of fraud and abuse. No study of this issue has found fraud nearly that high and the Governor has said he can't substantiate his claim of 25% fraud. To solve the problem, caregivers and recipients will be fingerprinted (the Legislature inserted an exception for recipients without hands!) and the state will hire dozens of investigators.

These represent a third round of massive cuts to programs and services in less than a year.

Another aspect of the budget put in at the last minute by the Governor would change enrollment for human services such as Medi-Cal to a computer-based system operated by a private company. This means the layoff of most social workers at the local level who assist people, and it creates a huge hardship for seniors (only 40% of whom have access to computers) and minority people who have even less access to computers to enroll. The budget also directs the state to put all seniors and disabled people under Medi-Cal into HMOs and denies them access to fee-for-service health providers (in what is being billed as a “cost savings” move). These recipients will have to change doctors and move to managed care. It will cripple the finances of community clinics and public hospitals.

In areas not directly affecting seniors, all of education took very large cuts, but (unlike senior services) public schools received a guarantee that funding cuts would be repaid in the future. Prison programs were cut, but plans to release 27,000 inmates were delayed until later in August. In one of the most controversial provisions, the state held back billions in funds for local governments in property tax revenues and redevelopment funds. Cities and counties were granted the ability to borrow the lost funds and the state will repay the funds with interest. Several accounting gimmicks also allowed several billion dollars to be moved into future years.

Most Capitol observers recognize that the Legislature and Governor will face more billions in shortfalls, perhaps as early as this fall. In addition to the accounting gimmicks and borrowing to be repaid, this budget includes $12 billion in temporary taxes and billions
in short-term federal stimulus money.

Shredding the Aging Services Network: Sept. 2008-August 2009

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger: Sacramento office (916) 445-2841; San Francisco office (415) 703-2218; e-mail from the governor's Web site at gov.ca.gov.
Assembly Speaker Karen Bass, D-Los Angeles: Sacramento office
(916) 319-2046; e-mail speaker.bass@assembly.ca.gov.
Senate President Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg, D-Sacramento: Sacramento office
(916) 651-4006; e-mail senator.steinberg@sen.ca.gov.
Senate Republican leader Dennis Hollingsworth of Riverside/San Diego:
Sacramento office (916) 651-4036; e-mail senator.hollingsworth@sen.ca.gov.
CPB Fact Sheets on the impact the Governor's Proposed Budget Cuts would have on children, seniors, and women. The Governor's proposals include cutting funding for public schools, lowering cash assistance payments that help seniors meet basic needs, reducing funding for health and in-home care services, and cutting child care funding. Three new fact sheets examine the impacts of various spending reductions in the Governor's Proposed Budget on these population groups.
New Analysis Examines the Local Impact of the Governor's Proposed CalWORKs Cuts
Governor Schwarzenegger proposes policy changes to the CalWORKs Program that would cause nearly 200,000 low-income children to lose cash assistance. A new CBP fact sheet examines the impact of these proposed cuts by county.

National Gray Panthers

California Chapters

Gray Panthers Liaisons

Autumn Quarterly Meeting

Gray Panthers California

Statements on the dismal state budget and the Governors's additional vetoes:

Shredding the Aging Services Network: Sept. 2008-August 2009