This will begin a long overdue conversation about the state budget and our state’s values.

For too long the discussion has been dominated by those who only want to cut the services Californians depend on. As a result, we’ve been forced to cut and borrow our way out of deficit after deficit.

And as the governor just noted, we’re facing even more cuts to our schools, to law enforcement and to our most vulnerable citizens.

That’s not what the people of California want.
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We are challenging Governor Schwarzenegger and our Republican colleagues to join us in reshaping the conversation.

It’s time that all of us in Sacramento show the courage to look at what really needs to be done to keep our fiscal house in order -- not simply continue to dismantle vital services.
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But, clearly, cuts alone won’t fix things.

If there’s a $14 billion deficit, you could close every one of the state’s public universities and still be nowhere close.

You could kick every Medi-Cal patient out of their nursing homes and still be nowhere close.

You could shutter nutrition programs for every child that needs them and still be nowhere close.

In fact, you could take all of those steps together and still face a serious budget gap.

The conversation can’t just be about price, it has to be about priorities, too.
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And no conversation about where the state should be headed can be complete without acknowledging the overwhelming need to fix the state’s broken health care system.

The health care reform we negotiated with the governor takes a giant step toward the universal coverage that Californians want.

And we wrote the plan specifically so it wouldn’t impact the state budget or add to any deficit.