Vote on state budget aims to beat deadline

SACRAMENTO — Legislators will vote on a new state budget Monday, even though they have yet to strike a deal with Gov. Gavin Newsom on a plan to close California’s $54.3 billion deficit.

The move could be largely procedural. State Senate and Assembly leaders said Wednesday that lawmakers plan to vote and then continue

“productive” talks with Newsom, to meet a June 15 deadline for passing a budget or have their pay cut off.

Their plan is to take up a budget that legislative leaders announced last week, which differed in several respects from the version Newsom put forward in May.

Legislators were running out of time to reach a deal because of another deadline, this one requiring that the budget be in print for 72 hours before a vote. That means lawmakers have to produce the text of a budget by Friday.

Assembly Speaker Anthony Rendon, DLakewood (Los Angeles County), and state Senate President Pro Tem Toni Atkins, DSan Diego, suggested that the budget could quickly change as they negotiate with Newsom.

“We will approve any amendments to the Legislature’s version of the budget as soon as they are eligible for floor action,” they said in a joint statement.

Newsom and legislative leaders have struggled to agree on a plan to erase the deficit that developed because of the coronavirus pandemic. The governor has proposed billions in cuts if the state doesn’t receive a federal bailout.

Legislators’ alternative framework would delay those cuts for months in anticipation of a bailout. If it doesn’t come, they would use more of the state’s reserve and delay payments to future years to avoid cuts to education, health care and safetynet programs.

Rendon and Atkins said they hope unions representing state workers agree to pay cuts, in case the federal government doesn’t provide assistance.

“Savings through the collective bargaining process are critical to maintaining the state’s fiscal health, in the event additional federal support does not materialize,” they said.

Newsom has proposed that the state’s 234,000 workers take a 10% pay cut.