18% pay cut to hit state officials

<p>SACRAMENTO -- State legislators and other elected state officials will get an unexpected 18 percent pay cut next month after lawmakers' challenge of a salary reduction backfired.</p><p>Legislative leaders had challenged the authority of the state's independent pay commission after it voted in May to trim salaries for those elected in 2010 and beyond.</p><p>But Attorney General Jerry Brown responded Thursday with an opinion that said the panel has the power to cut officeholders' compensation now, without waiting until after the next election.</p><p>The chairman of the Citizens Compensation Commission immediately asked the state controller to shrink the affected salaries, which include Brown's, in December.</p><p>"We're broke," said Chairman Charles Murray. "This cut needs to happen now. It's the right thing to do."</p><p>A spokeswoman for the controller's office, which was scrambling to ensure the necessary technical switch could be done in time, said it plans to cut lawmakers' base salary from $116,000 to $95,000 as of Dec. 7.</p><p>The governor's annual pay will go from $212,100 to $173,900, although Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger does not accept a salary.</p><p>The lieutenant governor's pay will drop from $159,100 to $130,400, and the attorney general will earn $151,100 instead of $184,300.</p><p>The cuts also will apply to the state treasurer, controller, secretary of state, insurance commissioner, superintendent of public instruction and Board of Equalization members.</p><p>Reviewing opinion</p><p>Senate President Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg, D-Sacramento, whose base salary would go from $133,600 to $109,500, refused comment. He already has taken a voluntary 5 percent cut.</p><p>His spokeswoman, Alicia Trost, referred calls to Senate Secretary Greg Schmidt.</p><p>"I don't know how we will proceed yet," said Schmidt, who did not rule out a court challenge. "There are multiple opinions on these matters."</p><p>Assembly Speaker Karen Bass, D-Los Angeles, declined to be interviewed or comment directly on Brown's letter. But spokeswoman Shannon Murphy said in a statement that Bass will review Brown's opinion.</p><p>"We will obviously follow the law and the Constitution -- as every state agency has the duty to do, including the compensation commission," Murphy said.</p><p>He said legislators probably will meet to discuss the issue early in December.</p><p>Proposition 112 cited</p><p>When the pay commission voted on the cuts in May, its members were advised by a state personnel attorney that the reduction could apply only to those elected starting next year. Schmidt and the chief administrative officer of the Assembly, Jon Waldie, sent a letter to Brown, approved by Bass' staff, requesting an opinion on the matter.</p><p>On Thursday, Brown said the state Constitution allows the seven-member Compensation Commission, which is appointed by the governor, to reduce the salaries of legislators and other elected officials in the middle of their terms.</p><p>Brown pointed to California voters' 1990 approval of Proposition 112, which requires the commission to "adjust the annual salaries of state officers" each year.</p><p>"Any other interpretation would require assuming against all evidence that the voters in 1990 intended midterm annual adjustments to only go up and never down, even in the face of a faltering economy and huge budget deficits," Brown wrote to legislative leaders.</p><p>He did not address a legislative challenge to another cut the commission approved: An 18 percent reduction in legislators' per-diem and car allowances, which also are set to begin next month.</p><p>Those matters are more complicated, said Brown aide Christine Gasparac, who said Brown may issue a future opinion addressing them.</p>