English
Reasonable arguments can be made against each of the “trigger cuts” that Gov. Jerry Brown plans as part of California’s midyear budget balancing act. All will be painful to one segment of the population or another. Effective advocates will lobby to protect most of the programs, and some will be saved for political reasons.
But as the analysis proceeds, state officials need to look beyond politics and to look for false economies—reductions that look good on paper but that actually end up costing the state more.
The most common example, of course, is cutting programs that actually generated additional income from other sources.
A less obvious example is at In-Home Supportive Services, where the governor seeks to save $100 million by making a 20 percent cut in the hours worked by caretakers of some of the state’s most disabled residents—the developmentally disabled, most commonly people with Down syndrome or cerebral palsy. Read Editorial
CALIFORNIA DISABILITY COMMUNITY ACTION NETWORK
Enacted in July of this year, the state budget included an assumption that the state would receive $4 billion in additional tax revenue during the fiscal year (July 1, 2011 to June 30, 2012). This estimate was based on what appeared to be a growing trend of increased tax collections. The budget, however, also included provisions that should revenue not materialize at the anticipated levels it would “trigger” additional spending cuts to account for that lost revenue. The budget instructed the Department of Finance to determine by December 15, 2011 if these trigger cuts would take place. 
