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Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger congratulated legislators for passing the budget package to address the state's $42 billion budget deficit.
“I am extremely proud of the members of the legislature, both Republicans and Democrats, who had the courage to stand up and put the needs of Californians first,” he said. “Rather than approaching this unprecedented crisis with gimmicks and temporary solutions, we took the difficult but responsible steps to address our entire $42 billion budget deficit and pass historic bipartisan reform measures.”
Schwarzenegger said it's a “difficult” budget, but, he added, “we have turned this crisis into an opportunity to make real, lasting reforms for California.”
State Sen. Patricia Wiggins, who represents Lake County in the state Senate, said the budget will help the state address its budget with a view toward the future.
“This budget, which includes spending cuts, revenue increases and borrowing, is not a pretty budget, but it’s a necessary budget,” she said. “It’s a budget which spreads the burden across the people and businesses of this state, but it’s also a budget which includes economic stimulus and government reforms.”
Wiggins said the budget addresses the state's short-term deficit problem while paving the way for long-term solutions such as economic growth and job creation.
“And if we receive our fair share of economic stimulus funds from the federal government, we will be able to reduce some of the borrowing and spending cuts, and lower some of the taxes, that we approved earlier today,” she said.
The budget deal makes moot a lawsuit filed against State Controller John Chiang last Friday by numerous counties – Lake among them – in reaction to Chiang's announcement that he would begin withholding payments to counties due to the state's budget crisis, as Lake County News has reported.
Chiang said the move was necessary because there wasn't enough cash left in the state's bank account to pay all of its bills. He stated that he was forced to delay $3.3 billion in payments to local governments, state contractors and taxpayers this month.
Chiang said Thursday that the long-overdue budget deal won't immediately fill the state's treasury.
“The Department of Finance has promised to provide us within a week with the data we will need to update our cash flow analyses and determine how to manage the state’s payments through the end of the fiscal year,” he said. “Once this budget plan provides the needed cash in the treasury, my office will work around the clock to get delayed payments out the door.”
County Chief Administrative Office Kelly Cox said local officials are still trying to figure out how the budget ultimately will affect local jurisdictions.
Paul McIntosh, executive director of the California State Association of Counties, told Lake County News on Thursday that 37 bills – that, stacked up, were about 1 foot thick – made up the budget package.
One of the biggest areas of concern was a proposal that arose during the budget negotiations that called for delaying payments for mental health, CalWorks and several other benefits program services to counties for a period of seven months, as Lake County News has reported.
“That is not in this budget package,” said McIntosh.
There may, however, be some payment deferrals in June and July, he added.
“It's much more amenable language to counties than was originally proposed,” said McIntosh.
There also are plans for a May 19 special election, which will feature six different propositions related to the budget. McIntosh said those propositions include proposals to divert monies from Proposition 10, which imposed a cigarette tax, and Proposition 63, a mental health services fund measure; a spending cap; and a proposition that would look at the state lottery.
The special election is estimated to cost counties $80 million, said McIntosh. Counties are asking for language to be included in the legislation so they will be reimbursed for the costs of the election, as they were last year's February presidential primary.
McIntosh said the budget includes cuts in health and human services, particularly to program recipients, and some county administration cost reductions.
“We're grateful that the Legislature has solved this issue,” McIntosh said.
Although the Legislature doesn't have the power on its own to change the budget process, McIntosh said there is a building recognition that the process is “absolutely ridiculous.”
He said a petition is circulating to change the vote percentage needed to pass a budget from the two-thirds currently required to 55 percent.
McIntosh said counties and the state have a dysfunctional relationship that goes back 30 years, to the passage of Proposition 13.
Proposition 13 shifted total fiscal responsibility to the state, and removed a great deal of power from Boards of Supervisors when it comes to deciding how funds are spent. McIntosh said that, as a result of Proposition 13, only about 10 percent of county budgets are now discretionary.
As for the calls from some people that a constitutional convention is in order, McIntosh said to be careful what you wish for. The concern, he said, is that some interests might try to take over that process.
E-mail Elizabeth Larson at
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The board met Feb. 11 for their annual strategic planning event to gather input on the direction for the district, according to district Superintendent Korby Olson.
With the long range forecast for the budget looking bleak, ways to save money while still providing high quality learning dominated the discussion, Olson said.
Olson said the school site councils from all of the schools and some other individuals were invited to attend the meeting and look at several key areas including, school configuration, fiscal solvency, educational options, student learning, technology projects and facilities.
The topic of school configuration was a discussion focus. Olson said ideas ranged from closing schools to grade reconfiguration to maximize resources. The fate of Cobb Elementary and Minnie Cannon Elementary were both discussed as the group grappled with the expense of operating small schools.
Olson said no decisions were made at the meeting, but the sentiment was clear that other options for decreasing costs should be considered before closing schools.
Cobb has been among the highest performing schools in the region and the top performer in Lake County since the Academic Performance Index was introduced, Olson said. A new school facility for Minnie Cannon is in the planning stages, so closing either school is no longer being considered.
Another topic of note was a discussion of increasing the Middletown High School graduation requirements to align with the requirements for admission to the University of California and California State University systems. Olson said several other districts in the state have made this move to assure that all students who graduate have the option to attend a university.
The board looked at other cost saving and revenue generating ideas, including charging a fee for bus transportation. Olson said the board has considered charging fees for bus rides in the past, but felt that they had not had enough input from parents on the topic to consider this option.
In other action, newly appointed Board member Lynette Carrillo took the oath of office.
Olson said the planning meeting took the place of the regular business meeting, so a board meeting was scheduled for Feb. 25 in the Middletown multi-use room at 7 p.m. Middletown Unified School District is located at 20932 Big Canyon Road. For more information call the district at 987-4100 or visit www.middletownusd.org.
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The California Highway Patrol reported that 19-year-old Ricardo Medina was arrested following the crash, which occurred at 10 a.m. Sunday, Feb. 15.
Medina was driving his 1991 Red Chevy Blazer westbound on Highway 20 east of Mitchell Road in Clearlake Oaks, while 57-year-old Pamela Joseph of Clearlake Oaks was driving her 1994 green Ford Explorer eastbound on Highway 20, the CHP reported.
The CHP report said Medina was unable to negotiate a right curve in the road and crossed into the eastbound lane and struck Joseph’s vehicle head-on.
Both vehicles sustained major damage and came to rest blocking the westbound lane, according to the CHP.
Joseph sustained major non-life threatening injuries while Medina only sustained minor injuries. The CHP said both parties were taken to Sutter Lakeside Hospital by Northshore Fire Protection District ambulance.
Medina is suspected to have been under the influence of alcohol and marijuana at the time of collision and was booked into the Lake County Jail after being released from the hospital, the CHP reported.
CHP Officer Joseph Wind is investigating the incident.
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WASHINGTON, DC – Rep. Mike Thompson (D-St. Helena) has been reappointed Chairman of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence’s Subcommittee on Terrorism, Human Intelligence, Analysis and Counterintelligence for the 111th Congress.
Intelligence Committee Chairman Silvestre Reyes (D-TX) announced the subcommittee assignments.
“Mike Thompson led active oversight efforts as a subcommittee chairman in the 110th Congress, and I am pleased that he will repeat this role again,” said Chairman Reyes. “As the Chairman of the Subcommittee on Terrorism, Human Intelligence, Analysis and Counterintelligence, his efforts are critical to ensuring that the men and women of the Intelligence Community receive the resources and authorities that they need to keep the country safe.”
Thompson will also serve on the Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee.
“I am honored that my colleagues trust me to help ensure our nation has the best intelligence programs in the world and that we are using our capabilities effectively and responsibly,” said Thompson. “The men and women who serve our country by gathering intelligence are one of our nation’s best assets, and I look forward to assisting their efforts.”
This is Congressman Thompson’s second term as chair of the subcommittee.
As chairman, Thompson will direct hearings, investigations and legislative initiatives under the subcommittee’s jurisdiction.
The subcommittee authorizes the budgets and activities of the Central Intelligence Agency, the Defense Intelligence Agency, the national security elements of the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the intelligence elements of the Departments of State, Energy, Treasury and Homeland Security.
“Securing peace and stability around the world cannot be done without effective intelligence gathering,” said Congressman Thompson. “My belief in the power of good intelligence to create a world without terrorism has only been strengthened by my experience on this Committee. We must continue to work for a world where intelligence is our best weapon, and war is our last resort.”
Thompson, a Vietnam combat veteran, served on the House Committee on Armed Services from 1998 until 2002.
He was appointed to the Committee on Ways and Means in the 109th Congress, where he currently serves on the Health and Select Revenue Measures subcommittees.
Visit Thompson's Web site at http://mikethompson.house.gov/.
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Acupuncture is one example of this. Acupuncture was developed after the Chinese discovered Ayurvedics using gold and silver needles on patients over 4,000 years ago. This practice is called “marma.”
But enough of Ayurveda for now. Let’s talk about some general principles of wellness.
When the very young child walks into the kitchen and mommy is sweeping the floor s/he may ask: “Mommy, why are you creating all this dust in the air?” Obviously mommy knows something the child does not. And that is this: One must get rid of the old and dirty in order for the new and clean to emerge. And then some general maintenance should take place before the next cleansing.
These three principles of creation hold true for the kitchen, home, yard, town, city, country and, indeed, the entire universe. In Ayurveda we call this universal process sattva, rajas and tamas: creation, maintenance and destruction. In sociological terms its called thesis, synthesis and antithesis (create, maintain and destroy).
So you ask, “What does this have to do with health?” Everything.
Would you wax a dirty floor? Would you clean an already clean floor? There is an order to creation that makes things work best.
I’ll wax politically for a moment. We get rid of one president and at least some of his policies in order to replace those policies with new and (hopefully) more workable and beneficial ones. We maintain the new policies until they prove unworkable or unsuitable and then the process starts all over again.
Now here’s my point. Job No. 1 for greater experience and realization of health and vitality is to clean out the “pipes” of the system. Clean out the toxic waste sites before we rejuvenate the system.
And what are the main toxic waste sites of the body? The liver, colon and kidneys. Can toxins, parasites heavy metals, bacteria and fungus be elsewhere in the body? Absolutely. But cleaning these main transformers and processors of nutrients is vital. They can easily become clogged and be overwhelmed by the above invaders and eventually cause disease and even life threatening situations. Taking even the finest herbal rejuvenate without first cleansing will often only push toxins deeper into the tissues.
So first consult with an experienced natural health professional and s/he will then give you an herbal/nutritional protocol that will 1) detox and cleanse. Then 2) rejuvenate and, finally, 3) maintain with healthy eating instructions as well as lifestyle practices such as meditation, yoga, breath work and appropriate exercise.
And remember, health is a lifestyle.
To your health!
Steven West, ND is a Kelseyville- based naturopath and nutritionist. He graduated form the Institute for Natural Health Studies and has been in practice in California for 18 years.
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LAKE COUNTY – Lake County's congressman said Friday that the economic stimulus bill will benefit not just the nation by the North Coast in the effort to get the sluggish economy revitalized. {sidebar id=122}
Congressman Mike Thompson (D-St. Helena) spoke with a group of North Coast journalists Friday, shortly before the House of Representatives voted 246 to 183 to pass the updated version of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (H.R. 1), which will spend $787 billion on the nation's recovery.
But the bill didn't meet the approval of Republicans and wasn't unanimously accepted among all Democrats in Congress.
In the House, no Republicans voted for the bill, and seven Democrats crossed the aisle to vote against it, with one Democrat not voting at all.
The bill had passed through a conference committee to work out the differences between previously approved versions of the bill that had passed through the House and Senate.
On Friday evening, the Senate also approved the updated version of the bill on a vote of 60 to 38. There were three Republicans who voted for it, with unanimous support from Senate Democrats.
Thompson, who would cast his aye vote a short time after the teleconference, said the bill is designed to jump-start the economy through a variety of measures – tax benefits for families and small businesses, substantial investment in infrastructure and innovation, and job creation.
It's important to move quickly, he said. “We've got a situation where the economy is hemorrhaging jobs – thousands of jobs – as we speak.”
The stimulus bill is supposed to create three to four million jobs, give $116 billion in tax cuts to 95 percent of working families and shift the economy to a basis of renewable energy through $50 billion in new funding and tax incentives, according to Thompson. Another $110 billion would repair and modernize roads, bridges, transit and waterways.
“It helps California a lot,” he said.
The state stands to receive $26 billion from the recovery package, to be used for everything from roads and bridges to upgrading schools, Thompson explained.
A bill analysis found it will create 400,000 jobs in California and 8,000 just in his district alone.
Thompson's district includes Lake, Del Norte, Humboldt, Mendocino and Napa counties, and portions of Sonoma and Yolo counties. Of those, the most recent unemployment report, which covers December 2008, has Lake with the highest unemployment, 13.1 percent, an 11-year high, as Lake County News has reported.
“We need to do this and we need to do it quick,” he said.
Thompson helped draft key energy tax provisions, including a new investment tax credit for facilities to manufacture green technologies in America rather than shipping those manufacturing jobs overseas. The provisions also will provide grants to incentivize businesses to invest in renewable technology today, rather than waiting until the economy improves.
He also was able to secure several key provisions in the final stimulus bill that will make crucial investments in green energy technology and led efforts to provide $4.6 billion in critical funding for the Army Corps of Engineers, which he said was left out of the original bill, prompting him to write to President Barack Obama and Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi.
The provisions he authored would make it easier for state and local governments to finance the purchase of solar systems and will have access to $2.4 billion in new energy conservation bonds to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
The bill includes $287 billion in tax cuts for individuals and businesses, which Thompson said accounted for 38-percent of the bill.
Projects Thompson listed that would be important for his North Coast district include work on the Sacramento Delta levee system and the silted-in Crescent City Harbor in Del Norte, as well as the Napa River, which flooded in late December 2005 and early January 2006 and caused more than $115 million in damage to Napa and the surrounding communities.
Thompson, who said he went to each of the counties in his district to ask them for a list of “shovel-ready” projects, didn't have a current list of projects that would take place in Lake County, but he'll work with the county on such a list.
County Chief Administrative Officer Kelly Cox said Friday that local officials don't yet know how the county may benefit from the package.
For the folks on Main Street, there will be a reduction in capital gains tax on the sale of small businesses, businesses would be eligible for new vehicle sales tax deductions, and individuals also will be assisted in purchasing solar energy equipment.
Individual taxpayers could see up to $400 in tax cuts on their tax bill, or $800 for couples, said Thompson. Anyone subject to the Alternative Minimum Tax, which is set to expire – about 28 million people nationwide, or 50,000 people in the First Congressional District – would see tax relief.
The bill also includes $7.2 billion to expand broadband Internet access in rural and underserved areas.
“It's real short in regard to what we need,” Thompson said.
That money will be spent in a few ways, he explained. For one, it will be used to expand broadband in rural areas where it's already used. It also will be installed in areas where it isn't already present.
“It's certainly good for rural America, that's where the holes are,” said Thompson. “It will help our district a lot.”
He and Rep. Anna Eschoo, a Bay Area colleague in California's Congressional Delegation, both wanted to see more done on behalf of broadband expansion in the bill, but there wasn't enough room to add the money needed.
Thompson said he and Eschoo plan to soon introduce legislation that would use bond funding to continue the broadband expansion effort.
Republicans maintain skepticism on stimulus package
Speaking on the floor of the House Friday, House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-OH) spoke against the stimulus bill, saying that the GOP's economic recovery plan would create twice as many jobs at half the cost as the Democrats' plan.
“When you look at some of the spending in this bill, it will do nothing about creating jobs in America,” Boehner said. “Tell me spending $50 million for some salt marsh mouse in San Francisco is going to help a struggling auto worker in Ohio? Tell me how spending $8 billion in this bill to have a high-speed rail line between Los Angeles and Las Vegas is going to help the construction worker in my district.”
He also criticized passage of the bill when he said that not one member of the House had time to read all 1,100 pages before the vote.
Boehner said Republicans have been excluded from the process altogether, and their ideas about how to solve the crisis were ignored.
US Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Kentucky) spoke against the bill on the Senate floor Friday.
“This isn’t Monopoly money. It’s real. It adds up – and it has to be paid back, by our children and by their children. And the American people still don’t have the facts about the total cost,” he said.
McConnell said it isn't timely, targeted or temporary, three critical points that he said the president's own top economist outlined for the stimulus.
The bill contains an extraordinary sum of money that deserves an extraordinary level of scrutiny, McConnell said, adding that it's laden with pork, including $300 million for new government cars, $50 million for out-of-work artist and $165 million to maintain and build fish hatcheries.
Thompson dismissed such criticisms. “The Republicans have had every opportunity to participate in this,” he said. “I don't think there's been any shortage of effort in trying to work with Republicans.”
The American people want members of Congress to work together, said Thompson.
He contrasted the president's bipartisan efforts with those employed by the previous administration, recalling a meeting between the Blue Dog Coalition – a group of moderate and conservative Democrats, of which Thompson is a member – and former Vice President Dick Cheney.
Thompson said Cheney told the group, “You all seem like nice guys, but we don't need you.”
Arguments over waste
Thompson also challenged the assertions that the bill is filled with pork and earmarks.
“There aren't any earmarks that jump out at me,” said Thompson. “The president has said that he didn't want any earmarks in the bill.”
An analysis of the House version of the bill by FactCheck.org found it essentially earmark-free, although the Senate version contained several items that could be considered pork – such as $198 million in benefits for Filipino veterans and $500 million for National Institutes of Health facilities in Bethesda, Md. (For the full analysis, see FactCheck.org: A look at claims about the stimulus bill.)
Still, the Council for Citizens Against Government Waste issued a statement Thursday urging Congress to vote against the stimulus bill.
“The compromise bill yielded little improvement for taxpayers,” said council President Tom Schatz. “In exchange for a paltry extra $13 a week in tax relief, Congress is saddling American families with thousands of dollars a month in new spending obligations and huge interest payments on the national debt going forward indefinitely.”
Schatz said there were no efforts to address the mismanaged and unnecessary programs that waste billions of dollars every year.
Not everyone in Congress is perfectly happy with the bill, Thompson said. “You can put me on that list.”
He wasn't, for example, happy to see a $15,000 first-time homebuyer credit in the House's original version of the bill reduced to $8,000 in the final version. The first bill also included stronger language on school construction, which he said was a deal breaker for some in the Senate who didn't think anything should be done in the way of building new school facilities.
However, Thompson said, “There's enough in this bill to like.”
On Saturday, President Obama said he plans to sign the bill shortly.
Obama said the money must be spent “unprecedented accountability, responsibility and transparency.” he said he's asked his cabinet and staff “to set up the kind of management, oversight, and disclosure that will help ensure that, and I will challenge state and local governments to do the same.”
Soon to be launched is a new Web site, www.recovery.gov, which will allow Americans to see where the money is going and to offer comments and ask questions, said the president.
“Ultimately, this is your money, and you deserve to know where it’s going and how it’s spent,” he said.
Obama said he plans to introduce a proposal that involves restoring discipline to the federal budgeting process.
E-mail Elizabeth Larson at
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