The Solution to California’s Continuing Budget Woes Is--Yes--Political : Governance: The entire political system must be restructured if we are to save the ‘soul of our state, who we are as a people.’

“Good” legislation has been defined as “a compromise that is mutually repugnant to all sides.” By that definition, the 1992-93 state budget, the product of a 63-day ordeal, is great legislation.

But the politicians who crafted and voted for it, and those who will soon feel its sting, would hardly label the spending settlement as such.

Indeed, some might call this year’s budget an obituary. It may well signify the death of community--the concept that a group of citizens and leaders should adjust their individual needs and fears to guarantee a better quality of life for all.

Others might call it an inescapable covenant with the demons of scarcity unloosed by an economy gone sour. Still others might deride the budget deal as politics-as-usual--only worse.

But the crisis goes beyond politics. What unfolded in Sacramento was not just about Assembly Speaker Willie Brown vs. Gov. Pete Wilson. Or about Neanderthal conservatives and wild-eyed liberals. It was not even about the fallout from the politics of race and class in a volatile election year.

It was--and is--about “a struggle for the soul of our state, who we are as a people,” according to one legislator.

Voters are tired of political chest-thumping and irresponsible thumb-sucking over who wins and who loses such political contests. There simply are no winners--nor should there be--in an exercise as brutal and distasteful as was this year’s budget process.

Call the legislative lunacy by any name you want. But what’s crucial, if we are to continue to call California a state, is: Where do we go from here?

Ironically, the short-term answer is political.

California’s economic health is inextricably intertwined with that of the nation’s. The priority the federal government gives to health, education and social-welfare spending affects the state’s budget and policy-making. Which is why the presidential election takes on added significance for Californians.

So do the contests for the two U.S. Senate seats and 52 congressional districts, 10% of the nation’s lawmaking body. Not to mention that the elections will probably result in a high turnover of state legislators.

The fall campaigns, then, provide an opportunity for voters to try to force candidates beyond the easy platitudes to specific proposals for solving the state’s budget problems. Ballot initiatives will allow them to choose between two ways to deal with the economic troubles.

Proposition 165, proposed by Wilson, would use dramatic cuts in welfare payments and increased executive control over state spending as the weapons of choice against future fiscal chaos. Proposition 167, supported by the California Tax Reform Assn., would raise taxes on wealthy Californians and businesses.

Here we go again! Fighting ballot-box budgeting with more ballot-box budgeting. Californians may want to rethink this approach.

Proposition 98, which guarantees schools a large share of the general fund, and Proposition 13, which limits local property taxes, were major sources of conflict in this year’s spending negotiations. The budget was held hostage to the affected special interests--teachers and local governments--fighting each other, Sacramento politicians and the constraints of a recessionary economy. Resolution was achieved by shifting around invisible funds.

In the waning days of the session, the Legislature passed and sent to the governor a bill, by Sen. Lucy Killea (I-San Diego), that would establish a constitutional commission to recommend improvements in the budget process. But how budgets are put together is only one aspect of the problem.

Californians must consider restructuring the entire political system that drives its government and the governmental institutions that reflect the system.

Special interests exercise increasing power over the budget process, and over policy-making of every stripe. This is a function of weak and beholden political leadership, which, in turn, is a function of what it takes to run for, win and maintain elective office in California--money.

The role played by the California Teachers Assn. in the budget battle demonstrated the legislative clout that a single, powerful campaign contributor can wield. As pay-back for years of political support and millions of dollars in contributions, as well as fear of electoral retaliation this fall, Democratic legislative allies hung tough with the teachers’ union, which remained rigidly opposed to tampering with 98’s funding protections. The unhappy result was a new record in time required to pass a budget.

Legislators eventually cried “uncle” and passed an education-spending plan that defied the teachers, but only after constituency outrage, media glare and sheer exhaustion checkmated the union.

This kind of roadblock has to be removed before the Legislature can hope to function effectively. But how? In an economic meltdown, is public financing of political campaigns the answer?

For a citizenry bereft of hope, money and political will, the alternatives are grim. Californians could choose to cut loose citizens who need society’s services but can’t pay for them. They could accept lowered expectations for everyone, spreading around the pain of retrenchment. Or maybe, when the economy starts to rebound, we’ll find the hope, resources and leaders to harness the political will to reclaim a quality of life that was the state’s standard.

Indications are that California will face yet another budget deficit next June, because this year’s plan is held together by so many accounting tricks and conveniently ignores the continuing growth in demand for state services.

Wilson, Brown and company can’t drag the state through this foolishness again, can they? Only if Californians decide to let them.