Pacific Grove, CA : Medi-Cal Recipients And Seniors To Take Another Budget Cut Hit

View From A Non-Profit Serving Carmel, Carmel Valley, Carmel-by-the-Sea, Gonzalez, Greenfield, King City, Marina, Monterey, Pacific Grove, Pebble Beach, Salinas, Seaside And Soledad California

Governor Jerry Brown has been on a slash and burn program in order to balance the state budget and his job just got much worse, with the announcement that he now has to deal with a bigger than expected budget shortfall.  The economy is not picking up as quickly as hoped for and the courts have ruled unlawful some of the budget cuts that he has tried to implement.  It's now expected that we will have a massive $15.7 billion budget deficit in California in the 2012-2013 fiscal year versus the $9.2 billion that was forecast just four months ago.  The Governor announced that he has no choice but to cut even deeper into social services budgets, almost doubling the cuts of $4.2 billion announced in January to $8.3 billion.  And these new forecasts already include a huge amount which will be generated from recent IPOs in the state.  Facebook, for instance, is expected to provide $1.5 billion in tax revenues by 2013 despite the recent slide in the stock.  The Governor said that if voters don't back his proposal to temporarily increase income taxes on high-income residents by up to 3% and raise sales taxes from 7.25% to 7.5% in November, things will only get worse.  "It won't be pretty," said Governor Brown.  A study by the Public Policy Institute of California on April 25 said 54% of likely voters will stand behind Jerry Brown's tax increases.  But you can be sure there will be quite a bit of press and political advertising behind this issue and the slim majority could easily change in the other direction.  This is a sad situation.  Those that need the help the most are likely to face more cuts in services.  At Hands To Help Seniors, we see people from all walks of life but one theme is common.  With both the federal and state governments slashing services, it continues to get more and more difficult to get by on a daily basis.