Cabaldon: We need to rethink priorities in the proposed state budget

This opinion piece ran in The Press Democrat of Santa Rosa on April 10, 2025

By: CHRISTOPHER CABALDON

Four months ago, Gov. Gavin Newsom proposed a state budget for the fiscal year starting July 1. While technically balanced, the spending plan assumes a $750 million cut to the UC and CSU university systems, no new funding for the state’s main homelessness and affordable housing programs and a withdrawal from the rainy-day reserves.

I’m the freshman senator representing Sonoma, Napa and four other counties. I’m also the new chair of the Senate budget subcommittee overseeing housing, homelessness, consumer protection, military and veterans programs, business services and some education programs. Prior to entering the Senate, I worked on higher education policy and programs for several decades, including a stint as vice chancellor of the California Community College system. I was a tenured CSU faculty member.

I know the budget as currently proposed will translate into fewer instructors and fewer classes for the 460,000 students who attend a CSU campus, and that it will hit Sonoma State the hardest. I convened a special legislative inquiry on the Sonoma State campus to investigate the devastating program cuts announced by the president, where I was joined by Senate President Pro Tem Mike McGuire, Assembly Majority Leader Cecilia Aguiar-Curry, Assemblymen Damon Connolly and Chris Rogers and Congressman Mike Thompson. Even though most of the Sonoma State retrenchment isn’t due to the proposed state budget cuts, they sure don’t help.

The proposed budget also eliminates funding for affordable housing construction, homeownership and the Homeless Housing, Assistance and Prevention Program, which last year allocated $1 billion to help local governments run emergency shelters, outreach and other initiatives to end or prevent homelessness. Sonoma County and its cities, including Rohnert Park and Santa Rosa, have used HHAP funding for outreach, to rapidly rehouse people, to support them in permanent housing and to operate more than 300 shelter beds.

“HHAP is critical,” said Michael Gause, the Ending Homelessness manager for Sonoma County. “If we lost it, you’d see more people on the street.”

The state’s budget situation must be bad if we must reduce funding for housing, homelessness and higher education by $2 billion, right? So bad that we also need to shift $7 billion from the state’s rainy-day fund?

Actually, the state projects revenues will be $16.5 billion higher this year. So what gives?

One answer that’s clear to me after chairing seven four-hour oversight hearings of the Senate budget subcommittee: the priorities are upside down and the number of executive branch agencies and initiatives just keeps multiplying. We’ve seen plans in the budget for a new agency, a new department, a new committee and a new council, each costing millions of dollars in administrative expenses.

We’ve received precious few answers about the performance and timeline for several state initiatives, including broadband rollout to Sonoma and Napa that is less than half-complete, but the governor’s budget adds tens of millions of dollars for new initiatives. While these may be worthy, they are not worth cutting core services like education, homeless programs and affordable housing. Tax credits proposed for particular industries and companies add up to more than the money being cut from the California State University system, with scant economic evidence to support that they’re the best use of taxpayer subsidies.

It adds up fast: $5 million here and $450 million there, and soon we’re decimating educational opportunity and reversing course on housing, homeownership, and homelessness right when the evidence on the streets suggests we might be turning the corner in many parts of the state.

As a freshman lawmaker, I can’t pretend to have all the answers when it comes to the state budget, but I know that this is not the time to impose drastic cuts on higher education or abandon our help to cities and counties to address the crisis of unsheltered residents. A state budget reflects the priorities of its people and its leaders. In the budget subcommittee I chair, we have so far refused to approve the business tax breaks, new initiatives and new and expanded state bureaucracy. I look forward to the governor submitting a revised budget for next year that invests in California’s people.

Christopher Cabaldon, D-West Sacramento, represents the 3rd state Senate District.

Read the Oped on the Press Democrat website here: https://www.pressdemocrat.com/article/opinion/sonoma-county-california-budget-newsom-uc-csu/