Governor Brown Struggles With Fiscal Crisis
SACRAMENTO (KCBS) -- The new year is likely to bring more squabbling in Sacramento over the state budget, and as Governor Jerry Brown enters his second year in office, California's fiscal crisis remains high on his agenda.
State lawmakers return to work on Wednesday, and for Jerry Brown that means starting the second year of a governorship that has been different from his previous terms.
"The Sacramento that he's facing today is not the Sacramento that he faced when he first came to office in the 70s," said Sherry Bebitch Jeffe, Senior Fellow at the Price School of Public Policy at the University of Southern California. Jeffe added that there was more compromising between the parties in those years.
KCBS' Melissa Culross Reports:
The state's fiscal crisis continues to be a top issue for the governor, and after failing to put a tax increase on the ballot through the legislature last year, Brown will appeal directly to voters through the initiative process to raise the state's sales tax and income taxes on the wealthy.
Jeffe said this is a big risk for the governor, and there are multiple tax initiatives on the ballot, by both liberals and conservatives. She said if these initiatives are confusing to voters, they may reject them all.
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