Gov. Gavin Newsom (D-CA) announced a proposal to cut thousands of vacant state jobs and funding to more than 200 state programs in order to close the state’s $27.6 billion deficit.
“These are programs, propositions that I’ve long advanced — many of them,” Newsom explained. “But you’ve got to do it. We have to be responsible. We have to be accountable.”
Newsom announced the budget proposal on Friday for the 2024-2025 fiscal year, which starts on July 1.
The Democrat’s proposed cuts include $2 billion to broadband that would have helped to expand high-speed internet connections, $500 million that was going to be used to improve the state’s water storage system, and $272 million that would have gone to improving employment services for California’s welfare system, among other things.
Other cuts consist of closing housing units with more than 4,000 beds throughout 13 prisons in the state and $300 million that was helping to provide state and local health departments with “COVID-19 pandemic-related” help would be decreased.
The move comes just a few months after a new recall petition against Newsom has been approved for signature collection.
Newsome defeated another recall campaign in 2021.
California’s Secretary of State, Shirley Weber, wrote in a Tuesday memo that the “Secretary of State’s office approved petitions for circulation for the recall of Governor Gavin Newsom.”
“The minimum number of valid signatures required to qualify the recall is 1,311,963 (12% of the 10,933,018 votes cast in the last election for Governor),” the memo noted.
Signatures must be submitted to the Secretary of State’s office by September 3 and be from at least five different counties.
