Budget Deal Reached - 7/20/09
State legislators and the Governor have reached a budget deal. For State Parks it means a $8 million cut, allowing the majority of state parks, beaches and attractions to stay open. We do expect to see some park closures and/or a reduction in services.
7/21/09
Better then we feared...
It's hard to believe that we would be sighing relief with the news that the Big Five is proposing a
$8 million cut for State Parks!
In the words of the California State Parks Foundation, "several sources are confirming that $70 million of the park system's General Fund allocation will be eliminated, with $62 million backfilled by other funding sources on what appears to be a one-time basis. This leaves the state park system with an $8 million gap, and is expected to result in park closures. At this time, there is not a list of certain closures, we do not know how many or which parks may be closed as a result of the budget deal."
The final budget will go before the Legislature for approval on Thursday or Friday.
Our hope at this time is that the cuts will be decided locally by the District Superintendent and their staff. We hope that our local parks might stay open, but with reduced services. State Parks is saying that they will be looking to their park partners to assist, which means that Stewards will be called upon to do more.
I cannot say it better then Traci Verardo-Torres from the Foundation, "the fact that we're looking at a much more scaled-down version of park cuts than we started with eight weeks ago is welcome news. It is certainly a testament to the Save Our State Parks Campaign, the tens of thousands of Californians – like you! – who stood up for their parks, and the efforts of all of us that we've stared down such a draconian proposal."
On behalf of Stewards, I thank you all for your incredible support. I encourage you to support our upcoming events, which will provide Stewards will the much needed funding that we need to assist our parks in staying open and minimizing the loss of services.
Michele
