Editorial: Panel to find waste could unlock budget impasse
Portland Press Herald:
Sunday, May 13, 2007
Lawmakers in Augusta are attempting a noble experiment in this Legislature by returning to the tradition of securing two-thirds approval of the biennial budget.
Maine law requires two-thirds approval of legislation for it to become effective in fewer than 90 days. For decades, that meant a budget settled in a session's final days needed two-thirds support to take effect at the start of the fiscal year on July 1.
A few cycles back, however, Democrats in control of the Legislature broke that tradition. They passed budgets on majority votes prior to March 31, allowing 90 days before they needed to take effect.
Understandably, this infuriated minority Republicans.
This year, budget deliberations have been allowed to lapse into May and possibly June. Leaders on both sides of the aisle have pledged to reach the two-thirds threshold.
Being out of practice with such compromise, it's not surprising that the process has been a little rocky. But the broad outlines of a compromise are starting to take form.
Republicans don't want to hike the cigarette tax and instead want cuts to MaineCare and other programs to make the budget balance.
Democrats say they're willing to make some cuts, but don't want to go as deeply into the MaineCare health-care program for the poor as does the GOP. Democrats favor hiking the tobacco tax.
The potential common ground is a proposal on the Republican side to create a panel to identify $15 million in bureaucratic waste in state government. That panel's recommended cuts would be voted upon next year to be applied to the second year of the biennium.
This approach is modeled after the Brookings Institution study of Maine policy, which recommended a panel find $60 million in bloat to be voted up or down.
Raising the amount in savings the panel would have to find and including some aspects of MaineCare administration in the review could bring the parties closer.
Attacking state government waste more aggressively would also help sell the effort now under way to consolidate local school districts as a way of saving money at the state and local level.
It's important that the panel have a broad mandate. No state agency should be shielded from its review, though it would be appropriate to say that certain state services or benefits should be maintained.
This is just one suggestion for compromise. Others will be needed if this experiment in bipartisanship is to be repeated anytime soon.
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