Gloomy Outlook
Photo by Steve Kotchko
Posted 4/7/09
A cold front blew past the State Capitol last Friday with gusty winds, heavy rain, plus thunder and lightning, making for a very gloomy afternoon. The atmosphere inside the building was equally stormy. The reason? Instead of working together to adopt a budget and tax package to end Connecticut’s worst deficit crisis in decades, Democrats and Republicans fell into their old ways, yelling at each other.
A quick-moving storm front can be scary but there’s often a rainbow after it passes by. To paraphrase Shakespeare, hopefully the sound and fury inside the Capitol will signify nothing, and our elected officials will get down to the business of restoring fiscal stability to the state. However, don’t hold your breath. It may take a while.
Democrats touched things off by releasing their own budget and tax plan, an official reply to Republican Gov. Jodi Rell’s budget delivered in February. Unlike Rell’s plan, which contained no new taxes, the Democrats propose $3 billion in increased taxes over the two years of the budget plan. They say this is necessary to prevent draconian cuts in state services and to address the state deficit honestly.
Rell trashed the Democrats budget and tax package as “the most fiscally irresponsible scheme I have seen in years at the Capitol”, charging that the proposal is comprised of “phantom budget cuts and astonishing tax increases.” The governor blasted Democrats for bypassing any meaningful streamlining of state government. “They do nothing to address the bloat of state government,” said Rell. “Not one agency elimination. Not one merger. Not one consolidation.”
In one of those nifty sound bites TV and radio reporters love, Rell also chastised Democrats for choosing to erase the current fiscal year’s deficit by borrowing. Said Rell: “It’s as if they have just given up. Just ring it up on the state’s credit card. Just charge it.”
Apparently burned by Rell’s words, Democratic legislative leaders fired back. They said it is the governor who has been dishonest with the public by proposing a state budget that used outdated lower deficit figures so she could claim the political high ground declaring she could balance the budget with “no new taxes.” State House Speaker Chris Donovan (D-Meriden) said his party is the only group that has placed a truly balanced budget on the table. Donovan hinted Democrats have been biting their tongue about the falsity they see in Rell’s plan, perhaps because her poll ratings are so high.
After Donovan spoke, State Senate President Pro Tempore Donald Williams (D-Brooklyn) let it fly. “At every turn, when we have reached out to the governor, the governor has criticized the Democrats and said things that were absolutely not true.” He railed at Rell for claiming the Democratic budget made no meaningful cuts. “We can’t let that pass,” said Williams. “The governor doesn’t get to skate away from her responsibility to be part of the solution and to tell the truth.”
Meanwhile, State House Minority Leader Lawrence Cafero (R-Norwalk), suggested Democrats went ballistic in their press conference because they’ve been getting phone calls from voters, upset by hikes in the state income tax, sales tax, and business taxes in their package. “That’s what they’re hearing,” said Cafero, “and they’re trying to put lipstick on a pig (their budget) and it’s not going to work.”
So what happens next? Democrats could “run” their budget and tax plan through the House and Senate any day they choose. Rell said if they send it to her, as is, she’d veto it. However, Democrats have a veto-proof majority in both chambers, at least on paper, so technically they could trump Rell’s veto.
Rell actually challenged Democrats to try that option. She predicted they couldn’t get enuf votes in their own party caucuses for the tax-laden package to overturn her veto.
So far, Democrats refuse to bite on that challenge. They said they are ready to negotiate with the governor on a compromise budget as they have in the past, and Rell said she too is ready to talk.
The wind usually blows pretty hard for a while after a weather front moves through. It may take a while for Democratic and Republican lawmakers, Rell and her budget crew to calm down, putting the hot rhetoric away, and getting down to business on a solid deficit remedy.
This week state government will pause to observe Jewish and Christian holidays. Hopefully, our elected officials will use the time for rest and reflection, and return to the Capitol in a more conciliatory mood, ready for real progress in resolving Connecticut’s fiscal crisis.