A quick check of the California budget crisis reveals that the state will not make scheduled payments to the public schools and county governments totaling a few billion dollars and that they’re getting ready to issue IOUs again. Details are in this LA Times report:

California’s top fiscal officials Monday ordered the deferral of $2.5 billion in payments to the state’s public schools next month to conserve cash and stave off the need to begin issuing IOUs.The state’s budget is 54 days late, and that delay has stretched the state’s depleted treasury to the breaking point. Issuance of scrip could come within weeks.

The deferral announced Monday “was not taken lightly,” state Controller John Chiang, Treasurer Bill Lockyer and Department of Finance Director Ana Matosantos wrote in a joint letter to the Legislature.
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State officials acknowledged the added hardship. “The lack of a state budget is levying additional fiscal stress on schools … deferral of state payments will further exacerbate the situation,” Chiang, Lockyer and Matosantos wrote.

Fiscal officials also ordered that a $400-million payment to counties be delayed; $700 million in county funds were pushed off in July.

The latest skipped payments to counties and schools must be repaid within 90 days, said H.D. Palmer, a spokesman for the Department of Finance.

Apparently these moves were expected, but they came a bit earlier than most officials were thinking. Furloughs are back, thanks to a recent court ruling that upheld Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger’s order and it’s just another typical late-summer in the Golden State.