Even with the ink barely dry on Gov. Jerry Brown’s budget signature, the battle over the state budget has moved to the courts.
Sacramento lobbyists and law firms across the state, representing a myriad of interest groups have lodged legal complaints against the state’s $85.9 billion budget.  Of interest are six legal challenges that dispute over $4 billion in funding choices made by the state, according to the Sacramento Bee.
Governor Brown remains optimistic that such legal challenges can be surmounted and given past experience, must be expected.
“I realize that given the funding complexity in California and the number of lawyers we have in the state we will get a lot of lawsuits. I don’t think we’ve heard the last of them,” said Brown in a press conference earlier this month.
State lawmakers already backed off on a $1 billion cut to First 5 childhood development programs when faced with a lawsuit filed with the Fresno Superior Court by multiple First 5 groups in various California municipalities, including Los Angeles.
Local municipalities have also shown concern over how the budget has worked to undermine the recently passed Proposition 22.
Prop 22 makes it illegal for the state to “prohibit the State… from delaying the distribution of tax revenues for transportation, redevelopment, or local government projects and services. Prohibits the State… from delaying the distribution of tax revenues for transportation, redevelopment, or local government projects and services,” according to a summary statement prepared by the attorney general.
The June budget has eliminated the agencies responsible for redevelopment funds and reconstituted them into a new form which has allowed the state to grab $1.7 billion in tax revenues slated to go to local governments for funding and redevelopment initiatives.
The California Redevelopment Association, a group that represents over 400 redevelopment agencies partnered local governments, has filed a lawsuit with the California Supreme Court to recover the revenue.
Senate President Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg (D-Sacramento) summed up the viewpoint of the Democratic-led legislature in saying that it is not fair for cities and counties to claim immunity from lifting their share of the burden in though economic times.
In an interview given to The Sacramento Bee, Steinberg said that is unfair for local governments to “set [themselves] as an island and pretend that the balancing of priorities of the taxpayers’ money is not your concern.”
While legal challenges to the June budget have not drawn the same ire as the 42 suits lodged against then Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger’s fiscal year 2009-2010 budget, the June budget has attracted its fair share of detractors.
It is hard to pin down a hard figure on how much money the state spends on litigation. The California Department of Justice does not parse out litigation costs individually and instead reports on overall expenditure on litigation, which is drawn from a general defense fund.