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Time - Man of the Year
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Time_Man_of_the_Year_Compact_Publishing_3YX-Disc-1_Compact_Publishing_1993.iso
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1993-04-08
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THE WEEK, Page 13NATIONCalifornia Dreaming
The banks have had about enough of the budget deadlock in
Sacramento
"The banking industry's willingness to accept the warrants
has acted as a shock absorber in keeping the pressure off the
legislature to solve the budget problem," concluded California
Banking Association official Greg Wilhelm. With that, after
swallowing a total of 876,000 California IOUS worth nearly $2
billion, the Bank of America and other leading California banks
last week stopped honoring the so-called registered warrants,
which the state has been paying out in lieu of real money.
Nevertheless, slow-motion negotiations back in Sacramento
between Republican Governor Pete Wilson and the
Democratic-controlled legislature, now oozing into a second
month, showed growing signs of urgency. The two branches of
state government were still hung up over the question of how to
close an $11 billion gap for a new $60 billion budget. At the
heart of the standoff was Wilson's stubborn insistence on
cutting education $2.3 billion. Wilson also threatened to veto
a compromise bill introduced in his own Republican ranks.
Assembly Speaker Willie Brown's Democrats just as stubbornly
drew the line and refused to cut school funding more than $605
million. Fumed the Assembly's education chairwoman Delaine
Eastin, a Democrat: "We're not going to balance the budget on
the backs of our children."
Under the strict balanced-budget laws that apply to 49
states, including California, hard choices must be made. New
Jersey, which experienced a comparable budgetary conflict
between its Democratic Governor and its Republican legislature
in reverse, last week announced a painful, unprecedented 8%
reduction of its 68,000-strong state work force through
attrition and a dispiriting 2,700 layoffs.