Because of decades of overspending by our State Legislators and Governors (yes, even Republicans get the blame since it takes a 2/3 vote to pass a state spending plan, which means, by definition, every budget has had some Republican votes), we are now looking at all kinds of ideas being bantied around by State Capitol denizens, trying to figure out where there may be funds out there to help close the vast multi-billion dollar gap between the state's available revenues, and what the Democrats would like to continue to spend.

One such proposal has drawn some fire here locally -- it is an idea put forth by State Senator Dave Cox (R-Sacramento Area) to gather up the funds that are in the accounts of the 58 "First Five Commissions" -- entities that receive big bucks from a tax in cigarettes, for the purposes of helping little kids under five years of age.  Apparently, collectively these commissions have billion of bucks in the bank.  OC Blog readers pay recall that these commissions were formed after the passage of Rob Reiner's Proposition 10.

Anyways, today in the Orange County Register, Supervisor (and former Assembly Republican Leader) Bill Campbell articulates why he supports Orange County's local First Five Commission (on which he sits representing the Board of Supes) and why he thinks that Cox's idea is flawed.

The purpose of this post is not to weigh in on the issue of who is right between Cox and Campbell, but rather to raise a separate issue which has been gnawing away at me since Cox's proposal first put the existance of First Five Commissions back on my radar screen -- and that is whether here in Orange County, government funds (forcibly taken through the cigarette tax) are providing public services for criminal aliens, or for the "anchor babies" of criminal aliens.

Look, I know that the First Five Commission spends a lot of money on what I would call "noble causes" -- but these are the kinds of causes that should be funded through the charitable giving of free citizens.  If government would only shrink, we would all have a lot more money available to give to help folks out.

That said, I don't think (and someone can set me straight if I am wrong) that there is political will being applied by the Commission to ENSURE that no funds are being spent on resources to benefit children in this country illegally.  Furthermore, I have also been able to discern no concern about what the impacts are on drawing more illegal aliens into Orange County of providing medical services to so called "anchor babies" -- the children of criminal aliens who, by virtue of being born on U.S. soil, becomes citizens.

In the broad sense, there is an important public policy discussion to be had about how we can realistically stop illegal immigration if we are not willing to stop providing government services to those here illegally.  And in the more specific sense, I am wondering why I should ring alarm bells to oppose First Five funds from potential "raiding" by the state when I get this nagging sense that it is being used as a vehicle to fund health care providers who in turn give services to illegal aliens and their kids.

I welcome some response to these concerns.