It's not exactly the sort of package a new governor wants to take to voters as his first big ballot test. Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger is asking Californians to refinance a pile of existing state debt, then borrow a little more.

The March 2 bond measure would be the largest the state has ever tried to sell, according to the state treasurer's office, which estimates it would cost the average California household $1,656 over nine years.

And the governor, who will begin his campaign for the measure in his first State of the State address Tuesday, has to persuade voters to approve the bond while pushing for major cuts in an array of state services in an effort to balance next year's budget.

California political experts say it's doable, but it won't be easy.

"I think it's going to take a campaign," said GOP political consultant Dave Gilliard. "A lot of people, especially on the Republican side, wish we didn't have to go down this road."

Gilliard said Schwarzenegger needs to "sell it as a way to get the state back to the starting gate, get us even so he can put in the reforms he talked about during the campaign, and make sure we never get into this situation again.

"I think right now he's got the confidence of the people ... but it will take some explaining," he said.

Schwarzenegger's $15 billion bond measure is designed to produce at least $13.2 billion for the state's general fund after borrowing costs are paid.

It is aimed at replacing $10.7 billion in borrowing authorized by former Gov. Gray Davis and the state Legislature to help balance this year's budget, a package that was jeopardized by a legal challenge.

Schwarzenegger, facing a larger budget hole since the courts rejected another $2 billion in borrowing and he repealed an increase in the state's vehicle license fee that Davis triggered last year, wants to replace the current bond package with the $15 billion measure.

To soften the blow for fiscally conservative voters, he is pushing for a companion measure that would set up a budget reserve and prohibit future deficit bonds.

But the same voters who turned out to remove Davis from office and install Schwarzenegger won't necessarily be in the mood to unquestioningly add to the state's debt, said Democratic political consultant Bill Carrick.

"He's going to have to spend some political capital getting it done," Carrick said. "He's now running into the flip side of what he took advantage of in the campaign, which is an awful lot of suspicion about politicians and politics. There's a lot of suspicion about how we got into this deficit mess and a lot of concern about how we're going to get out.

"He's now in the middle of something that he exploited."

That atmosphere will mean Schwarzenegger will continue raising campaign cash to finance the effort. He's already created two new political committees, one of which will be used for funds aimed at persuading voters to support the bonds.

Schwarzenegger's political team has begun its planning for the effort, but hasn't announced a budget or chosen a campaign director.

"We'll spend what it takes to win," said Marty Wilson, who helped build the infrastructure for the recall campaign and will help handle the logistics for this effort. "I think it's pretty critical to the governor personally and politically that we win this. We can expect a very robust campaign."

Little organized opposition has surfaced.

The ballot argument against the measure was signed by state Sen. Tom McClintock, R-Simi Valley, who was defeated by Schwarzenegger in the recall campaign.

He argues that additional cutting, not borrowing, is the answer.

"What does it buy? NOTHING," he said in the statement designed to appear in voter guides. "This doesn't buy a single school, road or park. It doesn't put a single cop on the street or relieve any traffic congestion. It simply papers over the gigantic deficit that Sacramento's politicians created in the first place."

State Treasurer Phil Angelides, meanwhile, who opposed Schwarzenegger's initial bond proposal -- a larger one that would have taken longer to repay -- has yet to take a position on the revised version.

"He wants to wait and see what the whole budget plans look like," said spokesman Mitchel Benson. "He's always felt it was wrong to do piecemeal solutions to the state's financial problems ... (that) the right way is to do one comprehensive plan laid out so everyone can see how all the pieces fit together."

Other traditional opponents of bond debt, Gilliard said, "will probably button their lips this time."

"The good will that he has will probably quiet some of the skeptics," he said. "Everybody wants him to succeed, for the most part. It doesn't matter what party you're in."

But Schwarzenegger's task is complicated by the fact that the bond will share the ballot with a major school bond proposal -- one that he also is expected to support. Voters in November 2002 approved a $13 billion school bond, the largest such measure in California history. They will be asked in March to approve the second piece of a package to finance school construction, a $12.3 billion measure.

"I've never seen a ballot which had not only one but two humongous bonds on the same ballot," said pollster Mark DiCamillo. "My instincts say that one of them will suffer. The question then becomes to what extent does the school bond measure hurt the governor's bond and vice versa."

Opinions differ on that score.

Carrick said his sense is that voters would prefer to back bonds that pay for something tangible, like fixing schools. DiCamillo said Schwarzenegger may have luck with a message that says his bonds are "trying to get the state functioning again and get the house in order," and that voters may see that as a higher priority than borrowing more for schools.

He said the title of Schwarzenegger's measure will also help. "It's called the Economic Recovery Bond Act," he said. "That's about as euphemistic as you can make it. Who's against economic recovery?"

California currently devotes about 3.3 percent of its general fund revenues to paying off debt. As currently authorized bonds are sold, that number will rise to 4.9 percent in 2005-06, according to the state legislative analyst.

If both the school bonds and the deficit financing bonds are authorized, the ratio would rise to between 6.4 percent and 6.9 percent a year until the deficit bonds are paid off -- higher than the 6 percent ratio financial experts consider prudent.

"As a public entity, California is now second only to the federal government in terms of the amount that it is borrowing to balance its budget," Angelides told the Legislature in a report based on the borrowing in Davis' last budget. "Unfortunately, rather than borrowing to invest in our future -- in schools, parks and transportation -- and to create jobs, the state is running up the equivalent of a huge credit card debt."

But GOP political consultant Dan Schnur says voters will buy the idea if they are told that the alternatives are even more unpleasant.

"Nobody loves the debt reduction bond. Nobody even likes it," he said. "But Democrats like it better than cutting spending and Republicans like it better than raising taxes."

Schnur said simply reminding voters that Davis was at the helm when the bulk of the debt developed won't be an effective argument.

Davis, he said, learned the hard way during the energy crisis that voters don't care who caused a problem -- they just want it fixed.

"Davis successfully convinced voters that he was not responsible for the energy crisis, and he still lost 30 points off his approval rating. Voters said, 'We know you didn't cause the problem. We don't care. We hired you to fix it,' " he said. "Schwarzenegger's smart enough to know that careening around the state telling voters it's all Gray Davis' fault isn't going to do much for him."

Carrick said the governor won't blame Davis because he'll need Democratic votes, and a partisan approach won't help him there.

"Their concern is probably we better make sure the Democrats vote for this based on their more progressive political values, and if we start with 'it's all the Democrats' fault,' you run the risk of creating a backlash," he said. "It is one of those odd things where a Republican governor is going to be more dependent on Democratic voters than in most initiative campaigns."

The fact that Schwarzenegger is a Republican will make it easier for him to make the case to fellow party members, DiCamillo said.

"It's the governor who has to take the lead to bring the Republicans over, and I think he has the mantle and the megaphone to do that," he said. "If Gray Davis were trying to do it, it would be tough."

Even if he is successful, however, Democratic political consultant Garry South says, the fact that Schwarzenegger has to expend political capital to do it has ominous implications for his governorship.

"This could more accurately be called the 'get out of the fiscal year without going in the toilet bond act,' because that's all it does," said South, who lived through years of budget difficulty as Davis' political consultant. "All it does is replace dubious borrowing that was built into this year's budget.

"The way they are going to have to sell this thing will result in a backlash when it becomes clear to people it did not solve deficits once and for all, and in fact, didn't even cure the deficit in the next fiscal year."