The Greenlining Institute Responds to California May Revise Budget Proposal
Statement from Kirin Kumar, Vice President of Policy at The Greenlining Institute, on Governor Newsom’s May Revise
Since Governor Newsom released his May Revise on May 14, The Greenlining Institute has been reviewing the proposal, consulting with partners, and assessing where the final budget must be strengthened to meet the needs of communities of color and low-income communities across California.
While the May Revise attempts to stabilize the state’s finances over the next two years, fiscal responsibility should not stop at balancing budget sheets. It means protecting the communities absorbing the costs of rising prices, climate disasters, pollution, displacement, high transportation, energy, and insurance costs, and federal rollbacks.
Equity Investments Are How We Get to Stability
Ahead of the May Revise, Greenlining urged the Governor to prioritize investments that make equity real. Investments in community-led climate resilience for those bearing the worst impacts of climate change with the fewest resources; clean transportation programs that reach the most pollution-burdened communities; community development finance and consumer protection as federal safeguards are rolled back; and implementation of California’s Racial Equity Framework.
In a year when electoral politics are being dominated by conversations about affordability and consumer protections, California’s government has a responsibility to meaningfully lower costs, protect consumers, and invest in the long-term stability of working families and communities.
These are not abstract priorities or short-term band-aids. They are investments in a California where communities can breathe cleaner air, survive and rebuild after climate disasters, access affordable transportation, strengthen local economies and resilience, build wealth, and shape the policies and investments that affect their lives.
Now is the Time to Fortify Equity
This is how California meets a federal administration intent on clawing back equity progress and clearing the way for the rich to get richer at the expense of working-class families, immigrants, communities of color, and low-income communities. California cannot control every federal decision. But as the fourth-largest economy in the world — and as a state that has repeatedly claimed a commitment to a more just and inclusive future — state leaders have the ability to fortify equity protections now.
We appreciate that the May Revise maintains proposed Prop 4 investments for key community climate programs, including Transformative Climate Communities and Community Resilience Centers. But taken as a whole, the proposal still misses a larger opportunity. Equity-centered programs are not optional while communities face overlapping crises. These are exactly the kinds of investments a responsible budget should protect.
Climate Equity Can’t Be Left to the Market
Those investments face additional uncertainty beyond the budget itself. As the California Air Resources Board prepares to vote on proposed changes to the state’s Cap-and-Invest program, California also has a choice to make about whether it will protect one of its most important tools for funding climate resilience and advancing equity.
Revenue from Cap-and-Invest has helped fund affordable housing, clean transportation, wildfire resilience, and community climate solutions across the state — and this is exactly what it was intended to do. Now is not the time for California to leave decisions about equitable investment to corporations or market forces.
The market has never prioritized frontline communities on its own — that is the role of government. Public dollars generated through climate policy must be directed intentionally and accountably toward the communities facing the highest pollution burdens and greatest climate risk.
Any action that weakens funding pipelines or creates more uncertainty for equity investments moves California in the wrong direction and undermines the state’s responsibility to ensure climate dollars reach the communities they were meant to serve.
Move Equity From Rhetoric to Reality
What good is a balanced budget today if tomorrow the very communities our state leaders promised to protect are left further behind? This is about whether California’s leaders are willing to do more than name equity as a value — whether they are willing to invest in it, sustain it, and build the public infrastructure needed to make it real.
California has choices to make. As final budget negotiations continue, Greenlining is pushing state leaders to protect and strengthen equity-centered investments. The final budget must show that California’s equity promises are more than rhetoric.
