SACRAMENTO, Calif. — At nonprofit organizations like Futures Explored in Sacramento, adults with intellectual and developmental disabilities learn skills to help them succeed in college and the workforce.

Kessy Paulson is part of the Film and Media program at Future Explored which teaches adults how to prepare for broadcast production jobs.

“It’s just so important and I know me and everybody in the program love being here because we get to learn,” Paulson said.

Many of the people who work at these organizations have been awaiting a pay raise for years.

Because of the state’s current $45 billion budget deficit, they might have to wait even longer — as Gov. Gavin Newsom proposed delaying a pay raise for more than 150,000 workers in his May revised budget plan for another year.

“None of this is the kind of [sic] work you enjoy doing, but you gotta do it. We have to be responsible, we have to be accountable. We have to balance the budget,” Newsom said.

Lyndsey Dyba, the interim director of Futures Explored, says she understands tough decisions need to be made to overcome the deficit, however, “they need to happen in an area where that does not directly affect the lives of people with disabilities, a very vulnerable population.”

Delaying the service provider rate reform would save the state $612.5 million in general fund spending. The reduction in spending means the state would also lose out on $408 million in federal reimbursements.

The total reduction in funding would be just over $1 billion for the year.

“We’re having to tell people, sorry we can’t help you find a job right now because we don’t have job developers. We can’t hire a job developer to work with you and support you and find that job that you want,” Dyba said.

Dyba says her organization has experienced a lot of turnover recently, as the stagnated wages have made it difficult to find and recruit people to help do the important work.

“I would actually make more money working in fast food than I would as a job coach today,” Dyba said.

It’s stories like these that inspired Assemblymember Stephanie Nguyen to write a letter to the governor, urging him to not move forward with the delay.

Nguyen is the mother of a daughter with a disability, so she knows how important it is to have services for the vulnerable population. 

“This is truly going to set back not only the individuals that were already born at a disadvantage, but also the family. We need service providers to be there, to help our families, help our children,” Nugyen said.

The letter she sent to Newsom had the bipartisan support of more than 50 state lawmakers.

“Already people with disabilities have hurdles that they have to overcome that a lot of people don’t have to and this just makes things more difficult,” said Assemblymember Joe Patterson. 

As for Paulson, the media production training has allowed her to learn new skills, and she hopes the service providers that teach people with disabilities get adequately compensated. 

“These jobs are needed, but you don’t get paid a lot and it’s just like… people like this are needed to help society run properly,” Paulson said.