Advice Abounds On State Budget
The General Assembly returned to Raleigh on Tuesday to mend a $ 2 billion budget hole — and to listen to the hundreds of voices of those who think they know best how to do it.
Lawmakers did little other than return to their desks and open the House and Senate for business, but outside, roughly 300 protesters crowded the sun-flooded steps of the Legislative Building to herald the legislature’s return with songs, chants, placards and this warning: Don’t damage state services.
From their lips came the plea to raise state taxes — a refrain that will repeat itself in coming days. Today, AARP North Carolina will urge lawmakers to consider raising cigarette and alcohol taxes to protect services for the elderly. The N.C. Lottery for Education Coalition will launch a campaign to build support for a lottery to pay for Gov. Mike Easley’s class-size and pre-kindergarten initiatives.
That’s just one side of the debate, of course. Next week, the state chapter of Citizens for a Sound Economy, an anti-tax group, hopes to swamp the Legislative Building with supporters to urge lower taxes and less government. A coalition opposed to a state lottery is planning to launch its lobbying campaign too.
The stream of advocates is not unusual when the General Assembly is in town. But it is certainly more of a river than usual as lawmakers prepare to face down the state’s worst budget crisis since the Depression.
“This is obviously a very critical and very special time,” said Bob Jackson, AARP’s state director, in an interview. “The size of the cuts necessary to approach balance is too horrendous to stand back and allow these cuts to go through. We need to speak up about alternative revenues. We need to let the legislature know how the public stands on these issues.”
Jackson’s organization will unveil a poll today showing wide support for two types of higher taxes: on cigarettes and on alcoholic beverages. AARP and dozens of other organizations are banking on those numbers to persuade lawmakers reluctant to raise taxes a second year in a row — and in a year when all 170 legislative seats are up for election — to do it anyway.
A coalition of 166 organizations put together Tuesday’s demonstration, at which protesters decried hundreds of millions of dollars in proposed cuts to mental-health programs, community-based programs for criminals, and health-care programs for children, the poor, elderly and disabled.
“I think we’re at a crossroads here,” said Louise Davis, executive director of REENTRY Inc., a nonprofit agency that provides sentencing services in Wake County. “The entire country has these problems. Instead of cutting every service this state has, they should be trying to save them.”
State workers protested the likelihood of little or no pay raises for non-teachers as well as the potential for hundreds of layoffs.
Advocates for community-based programs for criminals lamented proposed cuts to programs that help convicts return to society.
The marchers carried placards with such messages as, “This is budget judgment day. You better pray.” They chanted such phrases as, “Courage today. There is a better way. Budget for the people.”
Many of those at the rally mentioned the alternatives that lawmakers should consider: tax increases and closure of so-called loopholes, or tax breaks for special interests.
“Corporations are still getting tax breaks,” said Naeema Muhammad, 50, of Rocky Mount, a member of Black Workers for Justice. “Banks are still getting tax breaks. You know, the rich are still getting richer. The poor are still getting poorer.”
The General Assembly itself, meanwhile, did little other than launch the so-called short session, the purpose of which is to revise the budget for the year beginning July 1.
Easley has proposed hundreds of millions in cuts to the budget to make up for rising costs in Medicaid and declining state tax collections. But he also has proposed a state lottery — and has counted in $ 250 million of lottery revenue to balance his proposed budget.
Legislative budget writers began work on their budget weeks ahead of the official start of session. The budget must pass the Senate first and then the House. Senate budget writers expected to present their budget early next week.
Sen. Howard Lee, a Chapel Hill Democrat and co-chairman of Senate Appropriations, said the Senate Appropriations Committee planned to present its budget recommendations Monday or Tuesday in advance of a vote by the full Senate on Wednesday.
Lee said the budget leaders, who have asked subcommittees to recommend deep cuts in current spending, were still debating whether to include revenue from a lottery and increases in various fees in the proposed budget. They were struggling in particular with the depth of cuts required to balance the budget without any new sources of revenue.
“We had extensive conversation about that today,” Lee said. “It’s a tough call because it creates a lot of uneasiness among our members. We haven’t made a final decision. It makes me a little uneasy.”
Technically, the legislature is in the midst of two sessions this week — the one convened Tuesday to work on the budget, and a special session convened two weeks ago to draw new legislative districts.
House and Senate leaders chose not to adjourn the special session in the event that more work is needed on the districts, which are tangled in a partisan court battle.
Senate leader Marc Basnight, a Democrat from Manteo, said lawmakers agreed not to be paid for the special session, so they are receiving just one per diem payment despite the fact that two sessions are ongoing.
“We have this Rod Serling ‘Twilight Zone’ legislative session going,” said Rep. David Redwine, a Democrat from Ocean Isle Beach. “We have the regular session and the special session like a parallel universe.”
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Online:
Discuss how to balance the state budget at newsobserver.com.
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Other legislative issues:
Most of the General Assembly’s time will be spent on budget issues, but other issues could be debated.
– Limiting the length of legislative sessions. A bill cleared the Senate last year and is pending in the House. House Speaker Jim Black said last week that the measure deserved serious discussion. The bill would limit sessions to 135 days in odd-numbered years and 60 days in even-numbered years.
– Cleaning up the air. A proposal aimed at reducing pollution from the dirtiest power plant smokestacks may see action. Last month, Gov. Mike Easley and legislative leaders announced an agreement in concept with the state’s major utilities to cut pollution at coal-burning electric plants. To finance the cleanup, state regulators would freeze utility rates for consumers for at least five years. Those rates otherwise were expected to fall.
– School performance. Legislators may take up legislation that would give the State Board of Education authority to take control of a low-performing school if the school and the local school board have not followed the advice of a school assistance team.
– Division of Motor Vehicles. Legislators are considering a bill addressing allegations of ticket-fixing and bribery in the division’s operations in Western North Carolina.
