DFLers: Balance budget first

03/22/2005

Patricia Lopez, Star Tribune
March 22, 2005

Saying that they want to avoid another legislative meltdown, Senate DFLers on Monday proposed an unusual budget strategy: Use some of Gov. Tim Pawlenty’s own recommendations on budget cuts and revenue increases to eliminate the state’s projected $466 million deficit early in the session.

The premise, they said, is simple and one understood by the public: Balance the checkbook before you decide how much new spending you can do.

For Minnesota, that would mean solving the deficit before deciding how much more can be spent on schools or health care, roads or public safety in the next two-year budget.

But Republicans rejected that plan within hours, saying that DFLers were up to the same tricks that resulted in last year’s gridlock.

Pawlenty’s chief of staff, Dan McElroy, said the governor considered the plan “bizarre” and “not credible.”

Sen. Tom Neuville, R-Northfield, put it another way.

“What happened today is the beginning of political game-playing,” he said. “This is probably the foundation for gridlock. The public should be cynical about what’s about to happen.”

Confused? You have every right to be.

Republicans say that DFLers are being disingenuous, that they know the budget process is a messy one that requires a combination of carrots and sticks to get the support needed for passage. One of the chief carrots this year is the prospect of extra spending on schools and other hot button areas. One of the big sticks is the prospect of a deficit that must be resolved.

Combined, those pressures should compel the state’s 201 legislators to reach agreement on a budget of about $30 billion that will guide state spending for fiscal 2006-07, running from July 1 through June 2007. If they don’t agree by June 30, the current budget expires and the state government would have to shut down, because it would have no authority to spend any more money.

Senate DFL leaders say their plan would prevent that. It would, at a minimum, continue current funding and resolve the deficit. Republicans say that is what they fear, that the minimum would become the maximum.

“How do we know there would even be a stage two, that they [DFLers] wouldn’t just solve the deficit, go home and then blame the governor for no new spending on K-12?” said House Speaker Steve Sviggum, R-Kenyon.

Senate Majority Leader Dean Johnson, DFL-Willmar, said that DFLers “are very serious about balancing the state budget.”

Their plan, he said, would eliminate half the deficit chiefly by extending a higher tax on alcohol and car rentals. Both taxes had been scheduled to decrease. The other half of the deficit would be eliminated through a series of small budget cuts in various areas, including a 3 percent trim to most state agencies and departments. The plan would not adopt the deeper cuts in health care proposed by Pawlenty as a means of reining in the state’s fast-rising health care costs.

Former Democratic congressman Tim Penny, who was hosting a leadership seminar at the State Capitol on Monday, said he considered the DFL move “a tactic” that might be less than sincere, but still worthy of consideration.

Removing the deficit and the possibility of a shutdown from session debate would make for a cleaner—if riskier—discussion, he said.

“It would expose both sides to political risk,” Penny said. “Spending restraints don’t look so palatable when the deficit’s already been solved.”

On the other hand, he said, a tax increase to finance new spending could also be a harder sell. “But at least the debate would be more honest,” he said.

Even within the Senate DFL caucus, there were reservations about the new approach to budget-planning.

“I’m frustrated that we’re just talking about balancing the budget instead of our positive goals of funding education,” said Sen. Steve Kelley, DFL-Hopkins, a majority whip who also leads the Senate Education Committee. “The business of funding education, putting a transportation package together is what people want us to do first.”

At best, he said, the timing is wrong. “At some point we need to be prepared to talk about how we balance the budget,” he said. “But we have nearly two months for that. We should be telling people what we want to do about our schools and our roads.”

Senate Republicans predicted the measure would draw little Republican support when it comes for a floor vote today. Sviggum said he doubted the House would take action before the scheduled Easter break.