Budget disasters

I was in in Portland the past couple of days for a meeting of regional fish health pathologists and managers. The group is a committee that has been together for over 20 years, with bi-annual meetings to share notes, discuss individual problems, discuss policy, etc. What's been different and saddening is to see how deep various state and federal budget cuts are, cuts that impact a lot of good environmental science in the region. Because of the California budget crisis, state workers have been forced to absorb draconian budget cuts, furloughed employees, and a major reduction in the number of pathologists to cover the state. There's basically 3 left for the entire state, who must routinely travel to hatcheries all over the state in order to even carry out rudimentary inspections of fish hatcheries all over the state, some which raise Endangered Species Act-listed stocks. Sounds like a disaster in the making, not just for the loss of important services, but also because of the potential for a vehicle accident involving these hard-working and stretched to the limit people.

The entire situation makes our budget problems pale (although we may end up laying off many of our contract workers this fiscal year). More on this later.