• Posted on 06/03 at 08:44 AM
The Budget.
Salmon and Steelhead restoration has always fluctuated with state funding. Yesterday, Gov. Schwarzenegger in a rare joint session, told legislators “California’s day of reckoning is here.” The Gov. who has recently been criticized for his inconsistent stance on the budget, remarked “The immediate task before us is to cut spending to the money available to us,” and then added, “It’s an awful feeling, but we have no choice. Our wallet is empty. Our bank is closed and our credit is dried up … If we don’t act, the state will simply run out of money and go insolvent.”
Critics and reporters wonder if this is another one of the Governors maneuvering tactics in the increasingly heated budget talks since last month’s failure of the special election initiatives. Dan Walters of the Sacramento Bee reports, “The current estimate is that the state faces a $24-plus billion deficit for the 2009-10 fiscal year that begins July 1 as well as a looming cash crisis that can be relieved only by short-term loans that cannot be obtained unless the Legislature acts quickly to balance the budget. However, looming over the current crisis is the same political angst that accompanied February’s landmark adoption of new taxes.”
While current salmon and steelhead restoration projects remain in limbo, it is safe to assume new projects, excluding those directly funded through the federal stimulus package, will stay on the shelf. This comes at a particularly unfortunate time for central valley Chinooks, who over the past two seasons, have recorded their worst returns in recent memory.
