Billions in new cuts loom for California — including eliminating welfare and closing most state parks

By Karen de Sá
Mercury News
Posted: 05/26/2009 07:19:35 PM PDT
Updated: 05/27/2009 08:59:42 AM PDT

Faced with a ballooning deficit and a clear signal that voters won’t pay more to fix it, California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger released a budget plan Tuesday that would eliminate welfare, drop 1 million poor children from health insurance, cut off new grants for college students and shut down 80 percent of state parks.

In a state that long has prided itself on its social safety net, it could well go down in history as the most drastic reduction in social programs ever. And billions in further cuts will be unveiled later this week.
Read the rest of this story in the San Jose Mercury News. . .

Rather than threatening to close state parks, the state should be using the state parks as an economic stimulus to help get the nation back to work through green jobs and healthy, livable communities for all. A recent study by New York State, for example, shows that state parks give back more than five times the state investment, with billions of dollars in annual economic impacts in addition to 20,000 jobs.

Even in the midst of the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression, people across the United States voted to tax themselves to provide billions of dollars to create green space in November 2008. The Obama administration has launched a $787 billion economic stimulus package to get the nation back to work, and additional megafunds have become available for green space from other federal, state and local sources.

The massive amounts of funding available for public infrastructure projects including green space offers an exceptional opportunity to promote economic vitality, environmental quality and equal justice for all. Green infrastructure projects can provide multiple benefits including places for physical activity in parks and school fields; local green jobs for youth and small and disadvantaged business enterprises; Conservation Corps type programs to open job and career paths and to permanently improve national, state and local parks; public art in public parks; and public transit to parks and trails.

Click here to read the The CIty Project’s Policy Report Economic Stimulus, Green Space and Equal Justice.

Click on the image of Sinkyone Wilderness State Park to see more about The City Project’s work to diversify access to and support for the California State Parks.