With deficit forecasts growing darker by the day, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger is considering a plan to slash California’s safety net for the poor by eliminating the state’s main welfare program, health insurance for low-income families and cash grants to college students.

Officials in Sacramento began to bore in on the crisis Thursday, with the nonpartisan legislative analyst saying the deficit may already have ballooned to $24 billion and offering skepticism about some of the administration’s plans for closing the gap.

To balance the books, Schwarzenegger is eyeing the dismantling of the state’s CalWorks program, which serves more than 500,000 poor families with children, as well as the elimination of Healthy Families, which provides medical coverage to 928,000 children and teens. Mothballing the two programs would save the state about $1.4 billion in the coming fiscal year, officials said.

Read the Full Story – Poor would be hard hit by proposed California budget cuts – Los Angeles Times

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Calif. contemplating rewrite of social contract | San Francisco … – Carolina Fuentes and her daughter Katherine, 5, wait for an appointment at the Sacramento county welfare office in Sacramento, Calif., Monday, June 1, 2009. Facing a $24.3 billion state budget deficit, Gov. … California also tends to spend more on welfare than other states. The state spent 5.4 percent of all its state and federal funding on public assistance in 2007, compared to a national average of 1.7 percent. The figures don’t include Medicaid and other social …

California: Governor plans to completely eliminate welfare for … – California: Governor plans to completely eliminate welfare for families. by Eric Bailey . Global Research, May 25, 2009. LA Times. Email this article to a friend. Print this article …

Perspective: Grim times in California – Grim times in California. Calif. contemplating rewrite of social contract …. The state faces an unprecedented drop in tax revenue and a widening budget deficit amid the deepest recession in decades, prompting Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger to propose cost-cutting steps that once … Ending the welfare-to-work program for mothers and their children would affect some 546000 families, and health insurance could be eliminated for 1 million children from low-income families. …

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