Assemblyman Chuck DeVore defends state cuts

State Republican Assemblyman Chuck DeVore today defended many of Gov. Schwarzenegger’s proposed cuts to state programs to close a projected $19.9 billion state budget deficit.

With nearly three weeks into the state’s new fiscal year and no budget in place, the Irvine assembly member rejected proposals to save government programs by increasing taxes.

DeVore blamed bureaucracy for the budget woes and for the high unemployment rate because it didn't encourage businesses to stay in California.

“You have to ask why aren’t there jobs in California for these individuals to work?” DeVore told AirTalk's Larry Mantle today.

“Could it be because Forbes Magazine and other business publications rate us as having the worst business climate in the entire country because of our tax policies and our red tape policies? No wonder why there’s no jobs for working Californians because the legislature and their allies in the bureacracy have made it very inhospitable to create jobs in California.”

DeVore emphasized the need to encourage businesses to stay in California, rejecting the argument that tax increases will pump more dollars into the state economy.

“Here’s the challenge: last year we enacted the largest tax increase in U.S. history at the state level, roughly $9 billion a year. And as I predicted we ended up getting less revenue from that than we anticipated because we actually increased unemployment by increasing the sales tax, increasing the income tax, increasing the tax on the vehicle license fee," Devore said.

But while many Republicans have supported the governor’s cuts, Devore called the governor an “unreliable ally.”

The governor may make concessions in the final budget negotiations, he said.

“Part of the concern is that we... stand too firmly behind his budget proposals and at the last minute he ends up abandoning us because of one interest group or another pressuring him. ”

Due to term limits, DeVore is unable to seek reelection to the state assembly, but he and other assembly members are still fighting over state money problems even after the fiscal year has begun.

Democrat Tenoch Flores today criticized Schwarzenegger’s proposed cuts.

“The governor’s budget cuts education again,” Flores said. “It cuts child care, cuts home care, it adds people to the unemployment rolls.”

The Employment Development Department reported last week that the unemployment rate is at 12.3 percent.