The Sound of Silence

I guess my biggest enlightenment from our Youth Council trip to Sacramento was not the interviews with the State Superintendent of Public Instruction or the Mayor, it did not come from insights offered by the staff of Speaker emeritus Karen Bass, nor did it emanate from the words of other state senators and lobbyist that we encountered. My biggest enlightenment came in the few minutes we spent in the empty chambers of the California State Assembly and State Senate. Despite being in day 30 of a fiscal year with no budget, and despite the loss of 50 million dollars a day and countless state jobs, the members of the state congress, we were told, were on "recess." What some might call vacation! So a week off for the state assembly and senate will cost us another 350 million dollars. Nevermind that paltry sum, we're told the Governor might not sign a budget at all this year. Given that it is only the first of August, someone add up that dollar figure. To save time just multiply 1.5 billion dollars by the remaining number of months (5) and you will have the 7.5 billion dollars that we will lose added to the 1.5 billion we have already wasted and...you get the picture. When I say that my moment of illumination happened while in the state assembly chamber I should be more specific; I say it was the sound of silence that got to me, but not only the silence of the chamber itself, but the quiet outside of the chamber, outside of the Capitol, through the streets of Sacramento, and ultimately across the state. It was the absence of protest, the absence of revolt that was the most disquieting of all. Of course most Californians are upset and the delay may cost some representatives their job, but the anger, while palpable, has not translated into a coalesced movement or a collective demand for justice. After all, the state of California boasts a 1.8 trillion dollar annual gross domestic product, making us the 8th most powerful economy in the world, and we cannot pass what would be a 100 billion dollar budget? As I pondered these numbers while sitting in the echoed halls looking down on 80 empty seats along with a group of 15-17 year olds who were wondering whether their teachers would be returning in the fall, I longed for a little more chaos!