Lots of pain in Jerry Brown’s plan to deal with $16 billion deficit

As expected after the weekend warning, the revised budget Gov. Brown released this morning to deal with the state’s swollen $16 billion deficit reflects a steadily worsening fiscal picture. To deal with it, he’s proposing still more sharp cuts to health and welfare spending, a 5% reduction of the state payroll, and a freeze on new courthouse construction. From the LA Times:

To close the wider gap, Brown has heightened the cuts he wants to make to Medi-Cal, to $1.2 billion, and maintained another $1.2 billion in welfare and child-care savings he proposed in January. He also wants to slash payments to people who care for the disabled by 7% and reduce the state payroll through a shorter workweek or wage concessions. He proposed $500 million in cuts to the state's struggling court system, including a one-year freeze on all new construction projects.

Add: And as painful as all of that sounds, things get worse if voters reject the governor’s tax measure in November, he says.