Addition by subtraction: fixing the state budget

Editor’s note: This commentary was adapted from an interview the Press-Banner conducted with Assemblyman Bill Monning, D-Carmel, regarding California’s budget. The interview was July 21, shortly before the Legislature passed a budget with no tax increases and more than $26 billion in cuts.
Q: What are possible political reforms that will come out of this budget process?
A: I think the 2010 ballot is going to be ripe with different initiatives.
The language has already been introduced to make the Legislature a part-time Legislature. I think it is coming from an anti-legislator point of view. It comes from people feeling “you took too long to balance the budget.”
A lot of Californians would probably be glad to sign that or vote for that right now.
The question is: Is the interest of California served when it’s the eighth-largest economy in the world — when California’s $100 billion budget (now shrunk to a $60 billion budget) is supporting a $1.8 trillion economy?
For the $100 billion or $60 billion, you’re getting education, public safety, prisons, roads, highways and waterways. Some would argue that the public piece of that is a pretty good investment to drive a $1.8 trillion economy.
That’s one initiative we know.
There will probably be various iterations of the reform initiatives.
One initiative would reduce the budget making to a simple majority (from the two-thirds approval the budget currently requires). Another version would reduce the percentage (required) to raise taxes from two-thirds to maybe a 55 percent majority or a simple majority.
(The initiatives) would have to be presented to voters in different ballot measures.
The polling now seems to suggest people would support reducing the budget threshold, but there is more resistance to reducing the tax threshold.
Q: What is your stance on budget reform for California?
A: I definitely support bringing budget passage down to a simple majority. I would also favor bringing the tax-making threshold down to, say, 55 percent. I just think the majority party elected by the majority of voters should be able to own the budget. If I am part of that majority and we do a poor job, voters have a remedy every two years at the polling place.
I believe that with the election of (President) Barack Obama, with 60 percent plus in California — closer to 70 percent — people say that’s the direction we want to go. Yet we’re now in a state government where the minority party and the minority view on taxation and governance have extraordinary power, more so than (the Republican party’s) representation reflects.
Is that a check and balance that people want to preserve?