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New Governor Brown To Re-Appoint Old Budget Director

SACRAMENTO (KCBS) - Governor-elect Jerry Brown plans on re-appointing Arnold Schwarzenegger's finance director in charge of the state budget.

Brown, who will start working on the budget crisis Wednesday, will summon the legislative leadership and hold a public meeting on the issue in Sacramento.

KCBS' Doug Sovern Reports : [audio_linkurl="http://www.podtrac.com/pts/redirect.mp3/nyc.podcast.play.it/media/d0/d0/d0/dW/dB/dH/dK/WBHK_4.MP3" name="Brown re-appoints state budget director" artist="KCBS"]

Ana Matosantos will stay on as the director of the Department of Finance. In addition, Brown will appoint Diana Dooley as secretary of Health and Human Services.

Sacramento political consultant Leo McElroy said that retaining Matasantos signals that Brown will be using the same approach as Schwarzenegger.

"I think we're going to see something that's very similar to Schwarzenegger II. It's not going to be all that different. Jerry has already said he's not going to go for tax increases," said McElroy.

Brown will get a sense of the scope of the budget mess at Wednesday's forum which will include the Senate and Assembly leaders from both parties, as well as the state treasurer and controller.

The political consultant said, "this is not where the policy is going to be made," as he doesn't expect much to come out of the forum.

McElroy added that he doubts Brown will lay out priorities to an audience that may not be too friendly to many of the cuts.

(© 2010 CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.)

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