Bay Area Reporter - August 13, 2009
Matthew S. Bajko, m.bajko@ebar.com

But missing among the speakers was the city's four-member legislative delegation. Their absence was particularly noticeable, as the quartet of Democrats hardly ever miss a chance to rail against the state's GOP chief executive.

Organizers told the Bay Area Reporter that they had invited both state Senators Mark Leno and Leland Yee as well as Assembly members Fiona Ma and Tom Ammiano to speak at the August 5 event. Aides to Leno and Ammiano did read statements from their bosses, as the two openly gay lawmakers were both out of town on vacation last week, but Yee and Ma did not respond to their invites, according to San Francisco AIDS Foundation officials.

A spokesman for Yee told the B.A.R. that his office never received notice about the rally, and that in fact, the first time Yee staffers learned about it was when they saw the several hundred protesters gathered in the city's Civic Center from their offices in the state building on McAllister Street.

"The first we heard of it was from our district office folks who saw it going on out their windows and called us. I asked if we had been told of it or invited and they said no," said Adam J. Keigwin, Yee's spokesman who works in his Sacramento office.

Yee in fact was in San Jose that morning for a press conference with South Bay agencies working to end domestic violence to decry the governor's decision to eliminate $16.3 million in funding for the state Department of Public Health's Domestic Violence Program. He plans to introduce legislation to allocate money from the victims' compensation fund, which has a current balance of $136.2 million, to offset the cut.

Had Yee's staff known about the AIDS cuts rally, Keigwin said they could have reworked his schedule so he could be at both events. He said Yee is willing to work with AIDS advocates to push forward any funding solutions to offset the cuts to HIV programs and services.

"Senator Yee wants to restore any and all funding possible that the governor zeroed out," said Keigwin. "If there is a pot of money out there that can be used to backfill these cuts if the override of the governor's veto doesn't happen, he would be happy to push for that in legislation."

Yee and his staff could also have intervened for the protest organizers, added Keigwin, after they were denied permission to hold their rally on the sidewalk in front of the state building, which along with district offices for various state officials houses the state Supreme Court.

During the rally transgender activist Cecilia Chung, who has been HIV-positive for 16 years, told the crowd, "We were told we could not stand on state property to do our rally." Instead, she said the protesters would march around to the other side of the building on Golden Gate Avenue "to show just how many people are here upset at the governor's veto."

According to Debra Holtz, the spokeswoman for the AIDS foundation, the California Highway Patrol said groups are not allowed to use the steps to the building to hold rallies but can ask the city for permission to use the sidewalk. She told the B.A.R. that the city permits had been secured, but when organizers arrived Wednesday to begin setting up, CHP officers told them they could not use the steps or any raised sidewalk areas.

"The reason they gave was that because the building houses the California Supreme Court, they don't allow rallies there because it is seen as a conflict of interest. That was why the rally was moved across the street," explained Holtz in an e-mail.

Keigwin said Yee's staff would have happily dealt with the problem of where to have the rally if they had been called.

"Senator Yee loves taking on government entities that are intruding on people's free speech rights," he said.

Nick Hardeman, a spokesman for Ma, told the B.A.R. he would look into why the assemblywoman was not represented at the rally. But by press time Friday, he had yet to respond with an explanation.

Reese Aaron Isbell, a district representative for Leno, read a statement from his boss that said that the LGBT Legislative Caucus is "outraged" by the AIDS cuts and will do everything it can to reverse the governor's budget decisions.

"Having led the charge to save ADAP and the Office of AIDS from deep cuts as a member of the Budget Conference Committee, I believe it is an extreme act of bad faith for the Governor to unilaterally cut these programs after the fact in a disproportionate, cruel and inhumane way," stated Leno. "Democrats believe there are strong legal grounds to fight many of these vetoes. I will continue to stand with you to fight these devastating cuts in every way I can."

Ammiano aide Matthew Bunch also read a statement from his boss. Along with his gay colleague, Assemblyman John Perez (D-Los Angeles), Ammiano has taken the position that the governor's vetoes are unconstitutional. In a statement he released last month, Ammiano argued that Schwarzenegger had overstepped his authority; last week the Legislative Counsel's office issued a determination agreeing with that stance.

"People can say what they will about Gray Davis's tenure as governor but Schwarzenegger's legacy will be one of having left California a hollow shell of what we worked generations to build," stated Ammiano. "The governor's vetoes will reduce the ability of people living with HIV to access medical care and put the lives in jeopardy of more than 150,000 HIV-positive Californians while likely leading to an increase people in people contracting HIV due to the reductions in testing and prevention."

This week state Senate Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg (D-Sacramento) intends to file a lawsuit against the governor's vetoes. In a statement released Friday, his office said the suit will be called Steinberg v. Schwarzenegger. The lawmaker intends to use his own campaign funds to pay for the lawsuit, which will be filed in San Francisco Superior Court.

"We elected a governor, not an emperor," Steinberg stated. "In making these line item vetoes the governor forced punishing cuts on children, the disabled, and patients that he couldn't win fairly at the bargaining table. And in doing so, he overstepped his constitutional authority."

In its opinion issued the same day as last week's rally, the nonpartisan Legislative Counsel Bureau said the governor can only line item veto "appropriations," and what the Legislature sent him on July 24 were not "appropriations" but were revised reductions in existing, previously enacted appropriations that lawmakers had made in February.

In response, Schwarzenegger's legal affairs secretary Andrea Lynn Hoch issued her own statement last Wednesday defending the governor's actions, stating that the governor's veto authority to reduce or eliminate appropriations is "clear and broad" under the state constitution.

"The budget û original or amended û can only contain appropriations, so the governor's authority to veto these appropriations is unquestioned. Any attempt to characterize any of these items of the amended budget as not being an appropriation is simply wrong," wrote Hoch. "Here, the legislature provided that a certain sum of money û and no more than that sum û may be spent out of a particular fund on a particular activity. This is an appropriation. Any attempt by the legislature to improperly limit the Governor's veto authority will be struck down by the courts. The courts will protect the Governor's constitutional authority."

On Friday Schwarzenegger's press secretary Aaron McLear denounced Steinberg's planned lawsuit.

"The governor's constitutional authority to veto appropriations is unquestioned and will be upheld by the courts. Because the legislature failed to send him a balanced budget after months of debate the governor was forced to make these difficult cuts," he stated. "While Democrats are focused on a protracted legal battle to dig the state back into deficit the governor will continue to focus on moving our state forward and getting Californians back to work."

Keep abreast of the latest LGBT political news by following the Political Notebook on Twitter @ http://twitter.com/politicalnotes.

Got a tip on LGBT politics? Call Matthew S. Bajko at (415) 861-5019 or e-mail m.bajko@ebar.com.
090813
BR090804

Always watch for outdated information. This article first appeared in 2009. This material is designed to support, not replace, the relationship that exists between you and your doctor.

AEGiS presents published material, reprinted with permission and neither endorses nor opposes any material. All information contained on this website, including information relating to health conditions, products, and treatments, is for informational purposes only. It is often presented in summary or aggregate form. It is not meant to be a substitute for the advice provided by your own physician or other medical professionals. Always discuss treatment options with a doctor who specializes in treating HIV.

Copyright ©1980, 2009. AEGiS. All materials appearing on AEGiS are protected by copyright as a collective work or compilation under U.S. copyright and other laws and are the property of AEGiS, or the party credited as the provider of the content. .