Gov. Schwarzenegger Said on Wednesday that California is the first state in the nation selling Build America Bonds, and taking advantage of the new Federal Recovery Act . With this help, more than 5,000 projects will be restarted in California. Restarted projects cover everything from transportation, school construction, environmental and park projects, infrastructure projects and more. Many of these projects have been on hold since December 2008.

One of the most awaited projects to get restarted for Sacramento is the  The Railyards in the downtown district.

The Railyards, a joint venture with Thomas Enterprises will redevelop the 240-acre downtown Sacramento railyard, that has been on the books for several years.

Governor Schwarzenegger released a statement after the California Transportation Commission voted to give additional American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (Recovery Act) funding designated by the federal government for highway transportation infrastructure projects.

He said “We must maximize the use of precious tax dollars – not only in California’s General Fund spending but also with the Recovery Act funds coming into the state for federally defined purposes.  President Obama designated Recovery Act funding for transportation infrastructure to create and save jobs while also investing in our nation’s infrastructure – and in California we are working around the clock to take full advantage of each and every dollar.”

Upcoming Cuts in Sacramento area government jobs, including State and County services, will surely affect the Sacramento real estate market.

With the state of California about to start a round of massive layoffs beginning with about 6,000 employees in the next month, the Sacramento job pool is surely going to shrink.  The Capital region is home to many state offices who will be affected by the job cuts. Also struggling with the economy; Sacramento area Police Forces, road workers, firemen, teachers… 

• The Sacramento sheriffs Department will be sending out layoff notices next week to 370 employees.
• More than 900 Sacramento County employees would be laid off under the proposed fiscal year 2009-10 budget county officials were scheduled to release late Friday.
• Sacramento city leaders have sent layoff notices to 168 employees to help deal with a $50 million budget deficit.
• Sacramento City Unified’s school board recently cut 137 teaching positions, saving $4 million by increasing classes from 20 to 24 students per teacher for kindergarten through third grade.

The Sacramento area, four-county region’s jobless rate dropped to around 11 percent last month, compared to a modern-day record 11.4 in March, ending 11 consecutive months of rising unemployment. The drop in unemployment was surely boosted by the California state government actually adding 500 jobs last month.

Why would they do that?

Depending on whose numbers you use, we lost as a state, around 63,000–64,000 Jobs in California last month. This summer’s numbers won’t be so good…

The national economy lost 345,000 jobs in May, taking the total to 14.5 million unemployed workers.  The state has lost 706,700 jobs during the past year, the most in the nation. Almost 2.06 million people are unemployed, about 35,000 fewer than a month ago.