A Creative, Long-Term California Budget Solution That Finds a Middle Ground

[courtesy of California Progress Report]

By John Laird
Chair
Assembly Budget Committee

Our state parks are in crisis by any of a number of measures. In fact, the National Trust for Historic Preservation recently placed our entire 278-park system among the 11 most-endangered places in the nation.

Whether it’s a billion dollars in deferred maintenance, continuous weakening of operational support, the lack of money to staff new parks as California grows, or the basic inability to fund parks adequately in our annual budgets – we need a long-term solution.

Recently I proposed an annual $10 surcharge on non-commercial California vehicle registrations in exchange for anyone in a vehicle with a California license plate getting in to state parks for free—known as the Parks Access Pass.

A similar system works in Montana, and California would finally provide enough money for adequate maintenance and ranger services—and begin to work down the $1 billion backlog of deferred state park maintenance.

Earlier this year Governor Schwarzenegger proposed closing 48 state parks and beaches, causing a major public uproar. Following the governor’s announcement, more people called my district office about this than any other budget issue.

In his revised May budget, the governor gave state parks a one-year reprieve, but he proposed paying for it with a park fee increase. A fee increase adopted during a similar budget crisis earlier this decade dropped the number of park visits from 86 million to 76 million, proving that fee increases are a parks access issue for millions of Californians.

California’s park system is one of the most popular state services, yet budget support for the system has gradually been ebbing away. Two years ago we actually made a $250 million down payment on the $1 billion of deferred maintenance, but last year the governor took a majority of it back.

Funding for park operations has similarly been cut back, resulting in a de facto policy of not opening any new parks because state administrators believe there isn’t the money to staff new parks.