Empty Corridors
Photo by Steve Kotchko
Posted 5/8/09
As expected, the state legislature wrapped up its annual session June 3rd without adopting a new state budget for the coming two-year cycle that would erase the multi-billion dollar state deficit. In some past years, when budget crises existed, lawmakers and the governor feverishly worked together to write a budget by the adjournment date, but needed a bit more time in special session to fine-tune it and approve it.
This year, the crisis was much deeper, but the intensity of efforts to resolve it was weak. When the session ended, the only real budget communication between Democrats and Republicans was a set of dueling press releases blaming each other for the inaction.
The Democrat-controlled legislature technically called itself into special session for budget purposes several days before adjournment just to set the stage. If you think they went into action immediately after June 3rd, guess again. The photos accompanying this web piece show the real story. The lights are on at the State Capitol, but nobody’s home.
Leaders from both parties held press conferences the day after the session ended to offer their “spin” on the just-completed session and then left the building faster than Elvis after a concert that didn’t sell out!
Both parties promised their budget negotiators would be back at the conference table this week. However, leaders also told reporters fundamental differences still separate them, so the prospects for a quick resolution to the budget mess are dim.
In some ways, it’s as if lawmakers have been standing in the same spot since February when Republican Gov. Jodi Rell delivered her budget message. Democrats continue to charge that Rell purposely used low and out-of-date deficit figures, so she could offer a budget that contained “no new taxes”. Republicans still claim Democrats are lusting for tax hikes to ease the deficit, because they don’t have the guts to cut state programs held dear by labor and social service interests that are the Democrats traditional allies.
As for the governor, she’s still demanding lawmakers focus first on spending cuts before talking about tax cuts.
All of this rhetoric is getting a bit old. Clearly, there needs to be a breakthrough in budget negotiations to breathe some life into the moribund talks. There is little “chatter” out there about such a game-changing strategy.
Democrats make up the majority in the House and Senate. Their leaders indicate lack of cohesion in the ranks has complicated the situation. Many liberal Democrats in the House allegedly refuse to discuss significant budget cuts, while several moderate to conservative Democratic senators have no stomach for the hefty tax hikes offered in their party’s initial attempt at a budget plan.
Instead of going along with budget proposals offered by GOP leader Rell, House and Senate Republicans have offered their own budget plans, complicating the search for a bipartisan compromise.
Last week, the top Democrat in the Senate, Donald Williams (D-Brooklyn) said all players need to buckle down and devise a budget soon. “The state deserves a budget by the end of the fiscal year (June 30th),” Williams said. Of course, Williams is the leader who for months predicted the budget task could be accomplished by the legislative adjournment deadline June 3rd.
If the crisis goes beyond the start of the new fiscal year, things will get dicey politically, with questions about who has authority to spend money with no spending document in place. Though July 1st should be a “hard target” to shoot for on a budget deal, a summer filled with angst and foot dragging on the budget cannot be ruled out.
The sheer size of the state deficit, somewhere beyond $8 billion is daunting. The options needed to clear it: spending cuts, tax hikes, heavy borrowing all are fraught with political danger—if they weren’t, this fiscal challenge would have been put to bed by now.
Perhaps the best indicator of what will happen is whether or not those beleaguered budget negotiators actually report for duty this week, or if they procrastinate. Until officials from the governor’s budget office, the legislative budget office, and key lawmakers craft a working document for consideration by rank-and-file lawmakers and the governor, progress will continue to be a victim of politics.