A Sacramento Bee editorial this morning supports greater scrutiny of the state's contracts with private vendors. Although the newspaper does not support doing away with outside contracting, it does support requiring contractors to report their reasons for issuing contracts (as proposed in AB 756, which SEIU supports). You can look up any state contract over $5,000.

In a letter to California's congressional members, CalPERS is urging Congress to quickly overhaul the nation's health care system, The Sacramento Bee reports. Without reform, the letter, signed by CalPERS President Rob Feckner and CEO Anna Stausboll, said, "we will not be able to sustain our health care system." CalPERS is the nation's second-largest buyer of health care services. The CalPERS press release is here.

State Controller John Chiang announced yesterday that California will not only stop using IOUs for payments beginning Sept. 4 but will also redeem IOUs with interest that day. The move will end a "shameful chapter in our state's history," he said.

State Controller John Chiang has announced he will stop issuing IOUs Sept. 4, a month earlier than previously projected. Ending the IOUs, Chiang said in a press release today, "does not bring an end to our fiscal challenges." The press release includes a link to a graph of California's cash outlook.

Partly in response to a demand letter from ACSS, the State Compensation Insurance Fund board of directors has taken a stand on the furloughs that is very beneficial to ACSS members. Specifically, the board on July 31 authorized the SCIF president and CEO, Jan Frank, to “file a cross complaint in any of the pending court proceedings to obtain a ruling from the courts that all State Fund employees are exempted from the Governor’s Furlough Order – including those employees who are not represented by unions with current cases pending)” (italics in original). (Continue reading here.)

SEIU Local 1000 members have voted to give their leaders permission to strike. The union, which represents 95,000 state workers, are upset with Gov. Schwarzenegger for failing to have thei contract, negotiated in February, ratified. The contract called for one furlough day a month, and state workers now have been furloughed for three days. (Link has been updated.)

From the LA Times: With its staff furloughed three days a month, the Franchise Tax Board -- the state's tax collector -- could lose at least $550 million over the next three years and another $372 million for the two years after that from lost revenue and the backlog of dealing with disputes and late collections.

Gov. Schwarzenegger signed the budget yesterday, but not before paring it down further and nearly decimating some programs. For a bullet-point breakdown of the budget fixes, click here. And just when you've gotten comfortable, be warned that the new plan has "plenty of landmines," is "painful but precarious" and has no "safety net."

The governor signed the budget package this morning after making additional cuts that left it in the red.

This short item from the mercurynews.com (San Jose Mercury News blog) reveals the hardships of a couple of real people behind the furlough cuts -- and of the public.

The Sacramento Bee Capitol Alert blog reports the governor has ruled out a fourth furlough day for state workers as he makes his final cuts to the state budget.

A Sacramento Bee editorial, one of a series this week, defends the state furloughs as a necessary option to save jobs but says more must be done. State service needs to be made more efficient, with better use of technology and private firms to perform basic services.

A lubricant spill July 17 -- a furlough Friday -- took nearly 12 hours to clean up because nearby Caltrans workers couldn't be reached, prompting State Worker columnist Jon Ortiz to ponder: Were the phones not answered on purpose? Another Ortiz observation: The delay to close the budget deal cost the state the same amount of money it will save from the third furlough day.

State Worker columnist Jon Ortiz writes in today's blog that the 7,000 total state job cuts the governor announced in May and this month are still on despite the budget deal. The earliest date layoffs will begin is Sept. 15. Of the 5,000 May cuts, Ortiz reports, about 1,100 employees have either transferred or left state service.

CalPERS and CalSTRS together lost nearly $100 billion in the last fiscal year from the stock market beating.The decline means taxpayers will contribute more to shore up the two funds and state workers' contributions will increase. CalPERS has already announced it will demand increased contributions. CalSTRS can't ask for higher payments but has started talking to lawmakers about passing legislation to raise the contribution amounts.