SLO Leaders Rally for Revenues To Prevent Budget Cuts

San Luis Obispo, CA.   On July 29, dozens of seniors, people with disabilities, working families and nonprofit organizations will gather at Mitchell Park and march to the Farmers Market to protest Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's proposed $6 billion in cuts to California’s health and human services, and call on Asm. Blakeslee to support a modest fee on oil production and the rollback of corporate tax breaks to raise $6 billion instead.

 
“There are clear choices facing California,” said Joyce Lippman, Executive Director of the Central Coast Commission on Seniors. “California is the only oil-producing state in the world that doesn't levy a severance tax on oil taken from the ground, even though such a tax could yield $1.5 billion a year. Seniors and people with disabilities have been badly hurt by the last two budgets, we’d like to see a more balanced approach this year.”

 
Lu Traga, Systems Change Advocate with the Independent Living Resource Center, agreed. “We are deeply concerned that budget cuts to health and human service programs will have a devastating impact on local seniors and people with disabilities, who are already living on the edge,” Traga said. “Further cuts to Medi-Cal, IHSS and Adult Day Health Care will send thousands of Central Coast residents over the edge into institutions or homelessness.”

 
According to new research from UC Berkeley, the Governor’s budget cuts would cost the Central Coast more than 11,000 public and private sector jobs. This is counter-productive, said Carl Hansen, Executive Director of the SLO Food Bank Coalition, “Families at risk of hunger need us to create jobs and preserve the jobs we already have on the Central Coast.”

Organizations participating in the march and rally include Independent Living Resource Center, Central Coast Commission for Senior Citizens, Food Bank Coalition, Central Coast Clergy and Laity for Justice, Health Access, CAUSE, California Partnership, PathPoint and People First. They are calling for an alternative they call the Family Recovery Budget, which would include targeted revenue solutions to protect those who have already suffered the most in the recession from unfairly bearing more than their fair share of the burden of balancing the state’s budget.   Targeted revenue solutions include an oil severance tax ($1.5 billion), ending corporate tax loopholes that don’t create jobs ($2 billion), and temporary restoration of the Reagan- and Wilson-era upper tax brackets for the highest-earning households ($2 billion). These options would raise an estimated $5.5 billion and save 244,000 public and private sector jobs, compared with the 330,000 jobs lost from the Governor’s proposal.

WHEN:     Thursday July 29 @ 5pm

WHERE:  5:15pm-5:45pm: Mitchell Park, San Luis Obispo

Pismo Street between Santa Rosa and Osos

5:45-6:15 pm: March from Mitchell Park to the Farmers Market (up Osos to Higuera, Left on Higuera, through farmers market to Nipomo