Federal judges order California to free 9,600 inmates

SACRAMENTO — A trio of federal judges ordered Gov. Jerry Brown to immediately begin freeing state inmates and waived state laws to allow early releases, threatening the governor with contempt if he does not comply.

Citing California's "defiance," "intransigence" and "deliberate failure" to provide inmates with adequate care in its overcrowded lockups, the judges on Thursday said Brown must shed 9,600 inmates —about 8% of the prison population — by the end of the year.

Unless he finds another way to ease crowding, the governor must expand the credits that inmates can earn for good behavior or participation in rehabilitation programs, the judges said.

"We are willing to defer to their choice for how to comply with our order, not whether to comply with it," the judges wrote. "Defendants have consistently sought to frustrate every attempt by this court to achieve a resolution to the overcrowding problem."

If Sacramento does not meet the inmate cap on time, the judges said, it will have to release prisoners from a list of "low risk" offenders the court has told the administration to prepare.

Brown had already taken steps to appeal the court-imposed cap to the U.S. Supreme Court, and he vowed to fight the latest ruling as well.

"The state will seek an immediate stay of this unprecedented order to release almost 10,000 inmates by the end of this year," he said in a statement.

He had immediate backing from the California Police Chiefs Assn. The court order shows "a complete disregard for the safety of communities across California," said the group's president, Covina Police Chief Kim Raney.

"Pressing for 9,000 more inmates on the streets," Raney said, shows "an activist court more concerned with prisoners than the safety of the communities."

But a spokesman for the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department said it did not expect to have to contend with a flood of ex-convicts to watch over.

"It is never a positive step when prisoners have to be released," said spokesman Steve Whitmore, "but the Sheriff's Department is prepared for this eventuality."

Brown has until July 13 to file his full appeal with the high court, the same body that two years ago upheld findings that California prison conditions violated the constitutional prohibition against cruel and unusual punishment.

Lawyers for inmates, meanwhile, said Brown has few options but to let some prisoners go.

"At this point, the governor is an inch away from contempt," said Don Specter, lead attorney for the Prison Law Office, which in 2001 filed one of two lawsuits on which the judges based their order. "He must make every effort to comply immediately."

In May, Brown told the court under protest that he could further trim the prison population by continuing to use firefighting camps and privately owned facilities to house state inmates, and by leasing space in Los Angeles and Alameda county jails. In that plan, increasing the time off that inmates may earn for good behavior would have had little impact.

Thursday's order requires, absent other solutions, that the state give minimum-custody inmates two days off for every one served without trouble and to apply those credits retroactively. Such a step could spur the release of as many as 5,385 prisoners by the end of December.

A separate lawsuit, dating to 1990, alleges unconstitutionally cruel treatment of mentally ill inmates. That the courts are still trying, after two decades, to fix prison conditions was not lost on the three-judge panel that oversees prison crowding, U.S. District Judges Lawrence Karlton and Thelton Henderson and U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals Judge Stephen Reinhardt.

Their order accuses the state of "a series of contumacious actions" and challenges Brown's sincerity about obeying their orders. They noted that the governor lifted an emergency proclamation that allowed inmates to be transferred to prisons in other states, for example.

Requests from prison lawyers that the administration be held in contempt "have considerable merit," the judges wrote.

The governor's reluctance to set prisoners free early has the backing of legislative leaders, including Senate President Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg (D-Sacramento). He joked openly on Wednesday about intending to kill any population-reduction plans the courts might order the governor to submit to the Legislature.

Republicans in the Legislature have pushed a plan to resume prison expansion in California.

In April, they urged Brown to restore borrowing authority that would have allowed 13,000 beds to be added. They also asked that he continue to pay to house some prisoners in private facilities in the interim. Brown did not include such provisions in the budget that is now on his desk.

The judges said there could be no delays in compliance with their order for appeals or for amendments to the plan Brown submitted in May.

They rejected state officials' assertion that "with more time, they could resolve the problem."

California voters may be more willing than Brown to release inmates to reduce crowding. In a recent USC Dornsife/Los Angeles Times poll, they were wary of sacrificing public safety, but at the same time supported steps to reduce crowding.

Sixty-three percent said they favored releasing low-level, nonviolent offenders from prison early.

paige.stjohn@latimes.com

Times staff writers Chris Megerian and Richard Winton contributed to this report.

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-ff-brown-prisons-20130621,0,6492733.story

California Budget Puts Some Health Care Issues on Hold

by George Lauer, California Healthline Features Editor

California's budget agreement announced and approved last week puts a couple hotly contested health care issues on hold, making some stakeholders nervous and angry, but for the most part, this year's balancing act is kinder to health and social services than any spending plan over the past half decade, according to legislators and veteran Sacramento watchers.

"I would take this budget over the last five eight days a week," said Darrell Steinberg, Senate President Pro Tempore and one of the budget's main architects.

Steinberg, a Sacramento Democrat long considered a champion of health care in several  camps, acknowledged the budget didn't include all the health care spending advocates hoped it would -- particularly for Medi-Cal provider reimbursement and a certain type of autism therapy. Medi-Cal is California's Medicaid program.

"But overall I'm very pleased with this budget. You have to have some perspective. In 2009 we faced a $42 billion deficit in a $100 billion budget. It was almost half the budget," Steinberg said.

"Crafting a budget among 120 elected lawmakers and the governor is an art of compromise," Steinberg said in an email response to California Healthline questions. "Our goal is to get as much done as we can, and then work toward the next steps to deliver the help Californians need."

Early and in the Black

A week early, in the black and salting some cash away for a rainy day, California's $96.3 billion budget for 2013-2014  -- and consequently the mood in Sacramento -- is markedly different than recent years. For the past several Junes, offices organized betting pools to predict how late the budget would be and how deeply in debt the state would fall.

Thanks to a new tax approved by voters last fall and a recovering economy, the outlook is much brighter this June. The biggest winners in the post Proposition 30 budget are the K-12 school system and low-income working Californians without health insurance. Schools get more money and, perhaps more importantly, a new funding formula. Uninsured Californians who earn too much to qualify for Medi-Cal but not enough to buy health insurance will benefit from the expansion of the state's Medicaid program. Democratic legislators and Democratic Gov. Jerry Brown agreed to grow the Medi-Cal program as much as possible under the Affordable Care Act.

But money in this year's budget to pay for Medi-Cal expansion is ironically tempered by a 10% cut in pay for doctors, hospitals and other providers who treat Medi-Cal beneficiaries. Legislators and the governor decided to leave in place a deep cut made in one of the particularly bleak budget years -- 2011.

"The Medi-Cal rate issue is a very serious access issue," Steinberg said during a budget discussion on KQED radio last week. "You can provide all the insurance you want but if there aren't enough providers to be able to care for people, they're not going to get the health care that they need."

Health care advocates and organizations, including the California Medical Association, the California Hospital Association and the California Pharmacists Association, urged legislators to use higher revenue predictions in the budgeting process as a way to give the state leeway to repeal the 10% cuts made two years ago. Providers and consumer advocates predict that California -- already one of the lowest-paying states in the country for Medicaid services -- will have a hard time recruiting enough providers for the current 7.6 million Medi-Cal beneficiaries, let alone some 1.5 million more under expansion.

Steinberg said this year's balanced budget will give the state a better chance to increase Medi-Cal payments down the road.

"Being able to find the room to compensate doctors and pharmacists and hospitals more adequately is something that we ought to look to do in the future. We have a better chance to do that with the way we handled this year's budget than if we had taken the higher budget revenue estimate and spent more," Steinberg said.

Mental Health, Dental Spending Increased

The budget increases spending for mental health programs and adult dental coverage in Medi-Cal. The plan calls for $206 million to improve mental health care services, including $142 million in one-time general fund money in the coming fiscal year.

It also calls for $16.9 million this year and $77 million the following fiscal year to help partially restore Denti-Cal benefits for adults. Denti-Cal is California's Medicaid dental program.

Both are considered victories for Steinberg, who has been a leader for years in efforts to increase mental health and dental coverage.

"Three million people without dental insurance -- low-income people, mostly working -- are now not going to have to show up at an emergency room to deal with a root canal or abscessed tooth," Steinberg said.

"And mental health, which is always at the bottom of the funding priority list is now at the top with $142 million to build 2,000 crisis stabilization and residential beds so that people don't have to linger in emergency rooms or in jails or on the streets when they're living with a serious mental health issue," Steinberg said.

Steinberg in 'Sophie's Choice Position'

Earlier this month, Steinberg was named an "Autism Hero" by the Autism Health Insurance Project for his efforts in getting insurers to cover a particular kind of autism treatment -- applied behavior analysis -- known as ABA therapy. He has had some success in legislating that private insurers should pay for ABA therapy but his efforts to get the state to do the same fell short last week in budget negotiations.

Advocates in the autism community lobbied legislators to include money in the budget to pay for the treatment no longer covered under subsidized care since the state began dismantling the Healthy Families program, California's Children's Health Insurance Program.

"I feel like the governor put Steinberg in a Sophie's Choice position and that was just not fair," said Kristin Jacobson, president and co-founder of Autism Deserves Equal Coverage. She said not covering ABA therapy "is absolutely penny wise and pound foolish." 

She said new research shows about one in 50 school-age children in California has some form of autism -- about 2%. The state's decision not to support treatment for "something as serious and as big a public heath crisis as autism shows fundamental lack of understanding,"

Autism advocates said they appreciate Steinberg's efforts "but he's trying to carry the load almost by himself. 

The rest of the Legislature and the governor's office -- particularly the governor's office -- need to understand the importance of this crisis." Jacobson said.

Steinberg said he'll keep trying.

"Unfortunately this year, there simply wasn't enough room in the budget to fund ABA therapy in Medi-Cal for kids with autism spectrum disorder. I will not give up the fight, however. ABA therapy is the coin of the realm to help these children lead productive lives, and it's at the top of my list to get done next year," Steinberg said

Read more: http://www.californiahealthline.org/features/2013/california-budget-puts-some-health-care-issues-on-hold.aspx#ixzz2WaPCN4Gy

Statewide Day of Action - May Revision Actions

1515 Clay Street

Oakland, CA

12 noon

Contact: Pete at pete@communitychange.org 

or at 510-504-9552

State Building

2550 Mariposa Mall

Fresno, CA 93721

12 noon

Contact: Elizabeth at ecamarena@communitychange.org or

Rose at rauguste@health-access.org

300 S. Spring Street

Los Angeles, CA

12 noon

Contact Astrid at 714-396-8242 or

At acampos@communitychange.org

3649 Mission Inn Avenue

Riverside, CA 92501

(In front of Gandhi Statue)

11am

Contact Maribel at

mnunez@communitychange.org or

at 562-569-4051

The Capital

Sacramento, CA

Room: TBD

Time: following the Governor’s Announcement 10am-1pm

Contact Pete at peter@communitychange.org 

or at 510-504-9552

California Voters Split on Jerry Brown School Plans

California voters have yet to strongly embrace Gov. Jerry Brown's controversial plan to shift money from rich schools to poor ones, an ominous sign as he works to win support for the idea from skeptical lawmakers and the state's powerful teachers unions.

A new USC Dornsife/Los Angeles Times poll found that 50% of respondents agreed with such a move, to help school districts that serve low-income children and English-language learners.

But a significant minority, 39%, opposed the plan, which is embedded in the governor's budget blueprint and is the centerpiece of his education agenda. Brown has described his bid as "a classic case of justice to unequals."

Support broke along ethnic and socioeconomic lines, with 67% of Latinos backing the proposal, compared with 42% of whites.

Voters solidly endorsed a separate Brown proposal to give school districts more control over the state funds they receive, with 59% in favor. Only 41% approved of a legislative effort to make it easier for local governments to raise more education money through parcel taxes — a priority for many Democratic lawmakers.

In the past, Democrats and their allies in teachers unions have resisted upending the way schools are funded. Brown's most contentious proposal this year would give all districts a base grant, with extra funding for each student who is low-income, struggling with English or in foster care.

"Our future depends not on across-the-board funding, but in disproportionately funding those schools that have disproportionate challenges," he said as he unveiled his plan in January.

With race and class at its core, the proposal could open a thorny debate.

"The challenge for the governor here is to make a case that this is not a divisive issue but a rising-tide-lifts-all-boats" proposal, said Drew Lieberman of the Democratic polling firm Greenberg Quinlan Rosner, which conducted the survey in conjunction with the Republican company American Viewpoint.

Lisa Andrews, a Latina from Fresno, approves of the plan. The 47-year-old Democrat grew up in a small Central Valley farming community where her elementary school classmates struggled with English skills.

"If you're going to set tax money aside, then give it to those who would benefit the most from it," she said. "You have to be able to speak English and learn your grammar first, because the other classes are useless if you're not on equal ground" with other students.

On the other side of the issue, Dave Kanevsky, a pollster for American Viewpoint, described the governor's plan as "class warfare applied to schools" because it is framed "in terms of taking from one and giving to another."

Respondent Debra Sexton, 57, a Democrat and retired photographer from Corona, expressed a similar view. She said the idea of giving more money to poor schools at the expense of wealthier ones was fundamentally unfair, particularly to high-performing campuses.

"I don't think those schools should be punished because a lesser school isn't making the grade," she said.

Brown's proposal to give districts more spending flexibility would eliminate dozens of state requirements for specific programs, such as vocational training and summer school, and instead allocate more money to districts with no strings attached.

via LA Times