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SACRAMENTO – State Controller John Chiang this week released his monthly cash report for the month of June, and announced that the state's General Fund – the primary account from which California funds its day-to-day operations and programs – ended the fiscal year with a positive cash balance for the first time since June 30, 2007.
A positive cash balance means that the state had funds available to meet all of its payment obligations without needing to borrow from Wall Street or the $23.8 billion available in its more than 700 internal special funds and accounts.
“While this is welcome news after seven years of record-high borrowing just to pay our everyday bills, we still have much work to do,” Chiang said. “We should remain laser-focused on paying down the Wall of Debt, reversing the many accounting gimmicks to which we’ve become addicted and keeping the State as liquid as possible to avoid experiencing the payment delays and IOUs that plagued our State during the Great Recession.
“Another down cycle in the economy is inevitable – we just don’t know when or how prolonged it might be,” he added. “We should be vigilant about preparing for that day while we celebrate the great progress we've made to date.”
Because the state's cash position was over $5 billion more than expected when the Governor released his May budget revision, the Department of Finance – with the concurrence of the offices of the State Treasurer and State Controller – did not produce formal cash flow projections for the May Revision.
As a result, actual June and fiscal year receipts and disbursements are compared against projections provided in the Governor's January budget proposal.
According to the monthly report covering California's cash balance, receipts and disbursements in June 2014, the General Fund had $1.9 billion in cash on June 30, marking the first time it has ended the fiscal year in the black since 2007, when it ended the year with $2.5 billion in the bank.
For the 2013-14 fiscal year, revenues came in at $101.6 billion, or $2.1 billion (2.1 percent) more than projected in the Governor’s budget released in January.
Personal income taxes totaled $66.2 billion, coming in $1.7 billion above the January estimates (2.6 percent).
Corporate taxes totaled $8.5 billion, which was $725 million more than expected (9.3 percent).
Retail sales and use taxes came in at $22.2 billion, or $415 million under (1.8 percent) the estimates.
Revenues for the month of June totaled $14.8 billion, beating estimates in the 2014-15 Governor’s Budget by $304 million (2.1 percent).
Income tax collections for the month of June came in $635 million (7.4 percent) above estimates. Corporate taxes topped estimates by $289 million (13.2 percent).
Sales taxes came in short of estimates by $265.8 million (11.6 percent).
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Although California motorists are experiencing an uptick in gas prices in most metro areas, the state’s average is holding steady, making this summer’s road trips more feasible for many Californians.
On Tuesday the average price in the Golden State was $4.14, a slight $0.03 increase from a month ago, according to the AAA Northern California monthly gas survey.
Northern California’s average price for a gallon of regular unleaded gasoline is $4.14 – that’s $0.02 cents less than last month’s AAA reported price on June 10.
The highest recorded price ever registered in the state of California was in October of 2012, at $4.67 a gallon for unleaded regular.
The least expensive average price in Northern California can be found in Marysville, where regular unleaded gasoline is $3.94 per gallon.
Of all the metro areas tracked by AAA in Northern California, Eureka has the high price at $4.28 per gallon of unleaded regular.
Hawaii has the highest average price, $4.36. California reports the highest average price, $4.14 in the contiguous states. South Carolina enjoys the lowest average price, $3.37.
“State gas prices could continue to hold steady, as there are no dire consequences to oil exports at the present time,” said Cynthia Harris, AAA Northern California spokesperson. “That, combined with ample crude oil supplies nationwide, has kept fuel expenditures for consumers on a steady trend.”
The national average price of gas has fallen for 10 consecutive days, but remains the highest price for this calendar date since 2008.
On Monday, for the first time since June 11, the national average price for regular unleaded gasoline reflected a month-over-month decline.
Tuesday's average was $3.65 per gallon. That price was $0.02 less than one week ago and fractions of a penny less than one month ago. Still, the price is $0.18 cents more than last year’s price on July 8.
Violence in Iraq continues to have an impact on global oil prices, but as production in the south of the country remains unaffected, the fear of a disruption to supply has abated.
Market watchers are keeping a close eye on the situation, but the risk that had pushed oil prices to 2014 highs has subsided in recent trading sessions.
These elevated oil prices have meant stubbornly high pump prices for motorists, but as oil prices have eased so too have retail gas prices.
At the close of formal trading on the NYMEX, West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude oil settled $0.53 lower at $103.53.
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ST. HELENA, Calif. – Eight noted American wine regions have banded together in opposition to the rights-to-the-highest-bidder release of generic top level domain names (gTLDs) such as .wine and .vin by the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN).
The regional wine organizations that are driving the opposition include the Oregon Winegrowers Association (545 wineries), the Napa Valley Vintners (500 wineries), Sonoma County Vintners (230 wineries), Willamette Valley Wineries Association (200 wineries), Paso Robles Wine Country Alliance (160 wineries), the Santa Barbara County Vintners’ Association (150 wineries), the Walla Walla Wine Alliance (75 wineries) and the Long Island Wine Council (48 wineries).
These eight organizations, which collectively represent nearly 2,000 wineries, are voicing strong objections to the issuing of the .wine and .vin gTLDs, citing non-existent to grossly insufficient safeguards from illegitimate companies hijacking the history of fine winemaking in America and the rigorous, multi-generational efforts that have gone into creating, promoting and protecting quality winemaking regions across the country.
ICANN was established in the early days of the Internet to direct Web traffic to the correct servers and Web sites.
If granted to unscrupulous bidders, second-level domain names such as napavalley.wine or wallawalla.wine could be held in perpetuity by a company or individual that has never seen a vineyard, cultivated fine wine grapes or made a single bottle of wine.
“When it comes to fine wine, the distinctive expression of place matters a great deal,” noted Tom Danowski, executive director for the Oregon Winegrowers Association. “The importance of protecting the quality reputations of our fine winegrowing regions is what concerns us about ICANN’s recent action on domain names such as .wine or .vin. Fine wine consumers could be deceived into believing that they are visiting a website associated with a genuine product exhibiting the specific qualities and unique characteristics of a growing region, when they are in fact being influenced by an imitator who happened to be the highest bidder for that particular domain name.”
Citing the potential for consumer confusion and possible negative economic impact on the American fine wine industry, members of Congress, including Mike Thompson of California’s Fifth District and Anna G. Eshoo, of California’s 18th District have appealed to both ICANN and the U.S. National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) to delay or permanently stop the issuing of these domain names.
Of special concern in these discussions is an incorrect and misleading statement by the NTIA’s senior telecommunications policy advisor and U.S. advisor to ICANN’s Governmental Advisory Committee, Suzanne Radell, that it is “just three U.S. wineries out of thousands and thousands” that are objecting to issuing of the .wine and .vin gTLDs while addressing ICAAN’s public meetings held in London last week. The coalition of American quality wine regions representing nearly 2,000 U.S. wineries clearly contradicts Radell’s testimony in London on June 22.
The Oregon Winegrowers Association, Napa Valley Vintners, Sonoma County Vintners, Willamette Valley Wineries Association, Paso Robles Wine Country Alliance, Santa Barbara County Vintners’ Association, Walla Walla Wine Alliance and the Long Island Wine Council are also signatories of the Joint Declaration to Protect Wine Place & Origin, founded in 2005.
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NORTHERN CALIFORNIA – Have you recently graduated from high school and are wondering, now what?
The Postal Service is hiring and currently has over 200 job openings in the Bay Area.
They also have job openings in many locations in California and nationwide.
While mail volume has declined, a large number of employees have recently retired, leaving several vacancies. They also are anticipating expanding Sunday package delivery.
The Postal Service is a great place to work and while many of these positions are flexible in nature, they can lead to full time career employment.
Entry level city carrier assistants earn from $15.30 to $15.63 an hour, tractor trailer operators $16.57 to $18.25 an hour and automotive technicians, $19.29 an hour. The Postal Service also offers health benefits and paid vacation.
Applicants must be age 18 at time of hire (or age 16 with a high school diploma or equivalent) and must be a U.S. citizen or have permanent resident alien status.
Males born after Dec. 31, 1959, must be in compliance with the Selective Service System.
Applications are only accepted online by accessing the Web site, www.usps.com/employment .
The following are a few tips to help potential applicants navigate the website to find current vacancies:
- On a PC go to: www.usps.com/employment (the application does not work on MAC);
- Next screen - Under “Search Select Jobs & Apply Online,” click the link >Search our latest job openings;
- Next screen - Under “Job Search” – Select the city and location (i.e. San Francisco and California);
- Scroll to the bottom of the page and click the start button.
To see a listing of all current vacancies in the state of California, do not select a city or functional area. If a city is not listed, there are no vacancies for that location.
The Postal Service receives no tax dollars for operating expenses and relies on the sale of postage, products and services to fund its operations.