LAO Report on the May Revise: UC Barely Exists

The Legislative Analyst has issued its evaluation of the governor’s May Revise budget proposal. There is little of direct UC interest in the text. On the other hand, one would be hard put to find anything that would encourage the legislataure to “buy out” a tuition increase as the Regents wanted at their recent meeting.  There is nothing about UC pension obligations.  There might be a bit of relief for Cal Grant students at UC but even if so, the relief would come in future years.

The LAO has suggestions for reframing parts of the budget which might free up some money at the expense of K-14 (the Prop 98 world). And it raises a series of objections to the ways in which the Prop 98 formula guarantees are treated in the May Revise (although never saying they are “illegal”). The LAO has some doubts about the amount of money that will provide some budget relief as a result of the termination of local redevelopment agencies.

There is no proposal to cut back on the trigger reduction that UC would experience if voters do not approve the governor’s tax plan in November.

In short, UC remains the flea on the back of the elephant in state budget deliberations.

The May Revise analysis of the LAO is at:
http://www.lao.ca.gov/reports/2012/bud/may_revise/overview-may-revise-051812.pdf