California Budget Passed, Signed

Now that Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has signed a fiscal 2009 budget, almost three months into California’s new fiscal year, school districts will soon begin receiving more than $2 billion in long-delayed funding for programs such as remedial assistance and student transportation.

Child-care and preschool providers, which have not received money for subsidies to serve children from low-income families since June, will also see relief. Some agencies had to close their doors or turn families away during the budget standoff involving Democrats, the governor, and his fellow Republicans. ( California Schools Squeezed in Fiscal Vise , Sept. 17, 2008.)

In a press conference Sept. 23, the day Mr. Schwarzenegger signed the budget—the last remaining item of business from a legislative session that was to have concluded in August—he said he was directing the state controller to expedite “sending checks out to all the people...