CLT UPDATE
Tuesday, June 15, 2010
Spending continues as Retribution Day approaches
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Despite persistent problems with budget
balancing, House and Senate lawmakers sent Gov. Deval Patrick a new
spending bill Monday.
The proposal, the eighth supplemental budget approved by the
Legislature this fiscal year, authorizes $203.62 million in spending
for fiscal 2010, which ends June 30, including $162 million more for
the state’s Medicaid program, MassHealth, a massive program whose
costs are approaching $9 billion.
Gov. Deval Patrick has so far approved $507.6 million in
supplemental spending this fiscal year after signing into law a
budget of more than $27 billion last June, according to state
finance documents....
The bill’s approval followed the release of state revenue data
showing overall state tax collections heading into June, the final
month of the fiscal year, running $70 million below budget
benchmarks.
Asked about the source of revenue to support the latest spending
bill, [Rep. Paul J.] Donato [House Chairman, Joint Committee on
Municipalities and Regional Government] said, “We do have sufficient
monies in the budget.”
State House News Service
Monday, June 14, 2010
Lawmakers whisk $204 million spending bill to Patrick
President Obama urged reluctant lawmakers
Saturday to quickly approve nearly $50 billion in emergency aid to
state and local governments, saying the money is needed to avoid
"massive layoffs of teachers, police and firefighters" and to
support the still-fragile economic recovery.
In a letter to congressional leaders, Obama defended last year's
huge economic stimulus package, saying it helped break the economy's
free fall, but argued that more spending is urgent and unavoidable.
"We must take these emergency measures," he wrote in an appeal aimed
primarily at members of his own party.
The letter comes as rising concern about the national debt is
undermining congressional support for additional spending to bolster
the economy. Many economists say more spending could help bring down
persistently high unemployment, but with Republicans making an issue
of the record deficits run up during the recession, many Democratic
lawmakers are eager to turn off the stimulus tap.
"I think there is spending fatigue," House Majority Leader Steny H.
Hoyer (D-Md.) said recently. "It's tough in both houses to get
votes."
The Washington Post
Sunday, June 13, 2010
Obama pleads for $50 billion in state, local aid
House Speaker Robert DeLeo said Monday the
potential loss of nearly $700 million in expected federal aid for
the fiscal year that begins in two weeks has forced budget-writing
maneuvers unlike any he has seen in his 20-year tenure on Beacon
Hill.
Capitol Hill decisions that have put the funding in jeopardy have
prompted state budget writers to “start taking a look at
alternatives to our budget,” DeLeo said, adding that if uncertainty
around the funding continues, “We’ll just have to do the budget
without it and move on.” ...
DeLeo told reporters he spoke to U.S. Rep. Barney Frank on Sunday
and that Frank “feels we’re going in the right direction,” in terms
of obtaining the funding.
“I think he was realistic,” DeLeo said. “I think he feels optimistic
that everyone seems to want to get it done, but the point of the
matter is it’s not. It’s not done.”
State House News Service
Monday, June 14, 2010
Frank "optimistic" about Fed health care funds
News that retail sales dropped unexpectedly
in May leaves little doubt that an anemic recovery with few jobs
remains the major threat to the economy — greater even than a
yawning federal deficit.
Congress should act accordingly by passing a $24 billion measure
extending federal assistance to states, which have suffered from
plunging tax revenues. Should the extension fail, Massachusetts
will have to cut another $700 million from its budget. Here, as
in other states, a new round of layoffs would be the almost
certain result....
The state’s 10 Democratic representatives and Senator John Kerry
have come down firmly on the side of state aid. Republican
Senator Scott Brown, who cites “deficit spending that is putting
future generations of Americans in a deep hole,’’ has opposed
the additional funding.
Brown and other fiscal conservatives can play a productive role
not by blocking stimulus dollars that are needed now, but by
looking for ways to use federal money to promote efficiency at
all levels of government.... The initiative could be a model for
structural reforms in other aspects of state and local
government; unaffordable public pensions, for instance, aren’t
unique to Massachusetts.
A Boston Globe editorial
Tuesday, June 15, 2010
Despite deficit worry, Congress should give more aid to states
In the past week, U.S. Education Secretary
Arne Duncan, Sen. Tom Harkin (D-Iowa), and Reps. George Miller
(D-Calif.) and David Obey (D-Wis.) have taken to the airwaves
and oped pages to plead for the Keep Our Educators Working Act,
an “emergency” education spending bill. But merely calling
something an “emergency” does not relieve lawmakers of the
responsibility to exercise fiscal restraint.
This new bailout proposal is more evidence of the sham that was
last year’s $787 billion economic stimulus package. It included
$100 billion for education. States proceeded to spend that
one-time money on continuing expenses - mostly pay, benefits and
pensions for school personnel. With stimulus money dwindling and
thousands of teachers facing layoffs, states are begging
Washington for more cash.
The Keep Our Educators Working Act proves yet again how
“one-time” spending becomes the new baseline budget. Washington
already plans to spend more than $44 billion on elementary and
secondary education this coming fiscal year, but the bill’s
proponents say that isn’t nearly enough....
In fact the word “educators” in the bill’s title is instructive.
The bill doesn’t require the money be spent on teachers, much
less address the problem of “last-hired, first-fired,” which
puts seniority over quality. It’s a payoff to state
bureaucracies and the public-employee unions that own them.
Ignore the fear-mongering. If the national teacher unions and
their state and local affiliates would compromise on wages,
benefits and pensions, layoffs would be unnecessary. Instead,
the unions insist on contracts that would be rejected out of
hand by any private firm, oppose merit pay and tenure reforms
that foster competition and reward excellence, and maintain an
iron grip on budgeting by contributing millions of dollars to
toadying pols.
The Boston Herald
Tuesday, June 15, 2010
Teacher ‘emergency’ must alarm taxpayers
By Ben Boychuk
The president is asking Congress to support
billions in new emergency federal spending to prop up the
nation’s economy and keep hundreds of thousands of teachers,
cops and firefighters from losing their jobs.
That’s right, folks - it’s Groundhog Day in the nation’s
capital!
This time, however, the appetite for spending borrowed billions
isn’t what it was a year ago, even among Democrats in Congress.
You know the mood is different when a top House Democrat
acknowledges that American taxpayers have a case of “spending
fatigue.”
House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer’s statement of the obvious
came Sunday, a day after President Barack Obama urged passage of
another $50 billion in borrowing to bail out state and local
governments. Roughly half the funds would be used to avoid
teacher layoffs (a few billion for cops and firefighters, too),
while $25 billion would be used to compensate states for
additional Medicaid costs.
A Boston Herald editorial
Tuesday, June 15, 2010
Bonanza of billions
Days before they get to clock out for Bunker
Hill Day, state employees are flocking to Cape Cod’s windswept
dunes this week for a three-day beach blanket bonanza at a ritzy
Yarmouth ocean-front resort. They’ll sip Chardonnay at an
all-expenses paid banquet - all while earning taxpayer-funded
paychecks.
The sea-sprayed DOR bash, followed by Bunker Hill Day Thursday,
comes as a glut of Beacon Hill stalwarts hit the road for an
early vacation despite an ongoing fiscal crisis. Senate
President Therese Murray will powwow with officials about the
100th anniversary of the ill-fated Titanic’s wreck during her
week-long trip to Ireland.
“Massachusetts is sinking like the Titanic and the Democrats are
on vacation. June and July are for junkets if you get paid by
the taxpayers,” said outraged Massachusetts Republican Party
chairwoman Jennifer Nassour....
“We’ve still got a financial crisis on our hands and a lot of
important legislation to hash out with very little time before
the end of the session,” said Rep. Lewis Evangelidis (R-Holden).
“I find it astonishing that people are going on vacation - and
the Bunker Hill holiday just adds insult to injury.”
The Boston Herald
Monday, June 14, 2010
Hacks stretch Bunker Hill into blowout
House Speaker Robert DeLeo will spend Bunker
Hill Day Thursday plus Friday on a two-day jaunt in sunny
Chesapeake Bay - cracking crabs and rubbing elbows with baseball
Hall of Famer Cal Ripken Jr. as the Winthrop Democrat joins
other state workers looking to double their fun this “hack”
holiday.
News of DeLeo’s plan to show up at a national speakers’
convention comes after the Herald disclosed yesterday that
Department of Revenue employees intend to parlay their special
day off, enjoyed only in Suffolk County, into a three-day Cape
Cod beach blast at an oceanfront resort - on taxpayer time.
Republicans instantly mocked DeLeo for taking the much-maligned
holiday off and fleeing the State House during a fiscal crisis
as the state budget deadline looms.
“He should take the lead and demonstrate a willingness to
challenge the status quo,” said Rep. Karyn Polito
(R-Shrewsbury), who is running for state treasurer. “These
holidays represent a major disconnect between how government is
functioning and what people are facing.”
The Boston Herald
Tuesday, June 15, 2010
Robert DeLeo, Murray on hot seat for ‘hack’ holiday excursions
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Chip Ford's CLT
Commentary
More Is Never Enough (MINE)
and never will be.
"Gov. Deval Patrick has so
far approved $507.6 million in supplemental spending this fiscal
year after signing into law a budget of more than $27 billion
last June . . ." while "overall state tax collections heading into June,
the final month of the fiscal year, [are] running $70 million below budget
benchmarks."
"Describing deep cuts
lawmakers have made to state-funded programs, but omitting any
mention of the $1 billion tax increase they backed in 2009, House
Ways and Means Chairman Charles Murphy and Senate Ways and Means
Chairman Steven Panagiotakos warned of “substantial cuts” that
Massachusetts and about 30 other states would have to make if the
federal funds don’t come through."
Bacon Hill has sucked us
taxpayers dry. It dares not snatch more from us this close to what's
shaping up to be a contentious election only months away, so now is
going around us to the federal government for another bailout. Doesn't
it recognize that getting more from the Democrats in Congress is the
same as taking it out of our pockets, just less directly with fewer
fingerprints?
Even the U.S. Congressional
Democrats, House and Senate, are finally recognizing the handwriting on
the wall.
"'I think there is spending fatigue,' House Majority
Leader Steny H. Hoyer (D-Md.) said recently. 'It's tough in both houses
to get votes.'"
Only President Obama thinks
it's business as usual, that the borrowing and spending can continue.
But then, he doesn't face reelection until 2012 -- and knows we the
people can be squeezed still more before he faces any risk of being
deposed.
"Obama asks lawmakers to be
patient on the deficit, noting that a special commission is at work on a
comprehensive deficit-reduction plan."
When that "special
commission" reports -- soon after the election -- it's expected
to recommend a new Value Added Tax (VAT) be added on top of the federal
income tax burden.
More Is Never Enough and
never will be.
Look where we are.
● Cities and towns have
overspent, can't squeeze much if anything more from their taxpayers, so
are now dependent on additional state funding -- local aid -- to keep the
municipal gravy train running without interruption.
● The state can't keep
up the usual level of local aid to which municipalities have become
accustomed, and can't squeeze much if anything more from its taxpayers
statewide without revolt, so are now begging for "free" federal
subsidies to keep both local and state gravy trains on track.
●
The federal government --
while running up an unimaginable and historic $13 trillion national debt
-- is still printing and borrowing whatever it needs or wants, but is getting
nervous as well, wondering where it will borrow the next trillion and
who'll loan it. The nation's credit line is about to run out too.
The Great Recession is upon
us, and while we serfs have learned to live within our means, get by
with basic necessities as best we can, government on every level is --
simply incapable. While we struggle to survive through this
government-created train wreck,
our "public servants" are dealing with the pressures of crisis as only
they know how: PARTY ON!
While Rome burns, they'll
be off on the usual summer vacation junkets -- squandering more OPM (Other People's Money) for
one lame excuse or another. They simply can't help themselves. Sacrifice
is for the peons and unwashed masses, not them. Even with their
positions imperiled, they know nothing different.
Remember in November, only
140 days now and counting down to retribution at the polls.
Revolution 2010 is here,
the day of reckoning steadily approaches.
The clock is ticking .
. .
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Chip Ford |
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State House News Service
Monday, June 14, 2010
Lawmakers whisk $204 million spending bill to Patrick
By Kyle Cheney
Despite persistent problems with budget balancing, House and Senate
lawmakers sent Gov. Deval Patrick a new spending bill Monday.
The proposal, the eighth supplemental budget approved by the
Legislature this fiscal year, authorizes $203.62 million in spending
for fiscal 2010, which ends June 30, including $162 million more for
the state’s Medicaid program, MassHealth, a massive program whose
costs are approaching $9 billion.
Gov. Deval Patrick has so far approved $507.6 million in
supplemental spending this fiscal year after signing into law a
budget of more than $27 billion last June, according to state
finance documents. The extra spending has been accompanied by a
range of midyear efforts to control spending growth.
As the branches considered the proposal, which members approved
without debate or explanation, the House and Senate also adopted
Senate Minority Leader Richard Tisei's amendment exempting ROTC
instructors, whose salaries are often supplied by the military, from
teachers union dues. The amendment arose from a high-profile spat in
Worcester between a teachers union and ROTC instructor Stephen Godin,
a U.S. Marine Major. Godin has refused to pay an “agency fee” to the
union, arguing that he draws little benefit from the union because
his salary is funded by the federal government.
In a statement issued after the bill passed, Tisei noted that Godin
was threatened with the loss of his job, which he’s held for 14
years, if he didn’t pay a $452 fee to the teacher’s union by this
Tuesday.
“This is a great victory for Major Godin and other veterans who are
being strong-armed into providing financial support to unions that
provide them with no material benefits,” Tisei said. “These men and
women have already paid their dues with their service to our
country. Governor Patrick should do the right thing and sign this
language as soon as it reaches his desk.”
Tisei had sought to attach the same proposal to a bill to punish
assaults on health care workers, passed in the Senate last week, but
his proposal was ruled out of order.
The bill’s approval followed the release of state revenue data
showing overall state tax collections heading into June, the final
month of the fiscal year, running $70 million below budget
benchmarks.
Asked about the source of revenue to support the latest spending
bill, Donato said, “We do have sufficient monies in the budget.”
House budget aides said the largest deficits had been monitored for
months and the smaller ones would likely be covered through budget
management tools.
After the House approved the bill, Rep. Brad Hill (R-Ipswich) told
the News Service the bill did not require any use of rainy day funds
and said he expected “revenues from the past couple months” and the
use of unused monies in unspecified funds to help pay for the bill.
Hill said House Republicans were awaiting word from House and
Patrick administration budget offices on the specific funds that
will provide revenues to help pay for the bill's spending
authorizations - information about those funds was unavailable
Monday from the administration.
“We can afford to do this,” said Hill.
Hill noted the bill's largest expenditure, $162 million more for the
massive Medicaid program, would trigger a 60 percent federal
reimbursement.
Hill ticked off a list of other spending initiatives in the bill,
including $4.8 million for sheriffs, $15 million for the Group
Insurance Commission, $8 million for the Committee for Public
Counsel Services, $5 million for welfare programs, and $5.7 million
to cover collective bargaining agreements with public employees.
Some of the line items in the bill are miniscule, including $17 for
a nurses’ union contract.
The Washington Post
Sunday, June 13, 2010
Obama pleads for $50 billion in state, local aid
By Lori Montgomery
President Obama urged reluctant lawmakers Saturday to quickly
approve nearly $50 billion in emergency aid to state and local
governments, saying the money is needed to avoid "massive layoffs of
teachers, police and firefighters" and to support the still-fragile
economic recovery.
In a letter to congressional leaders, Obama defended last year's
huge economic stimulus package, saying it helped break the economy's
free fall, but argued that more spending is urgent and unavoidable.
"We must take these emergency measures," he wrote in an appeal aimed
primarily at members of his own party.
The letter comes as rising concern about the national debt is
undermining congressional support for additional spending to bolster
the economy. Many economists say more spending could help bring down
persistently high unemployment, but with Republicans making an issue
of the record deficits run up during the recession, many Democratic
lawmakers are eager to turn off the stimulus tap.
"I think there is spending fatigue," House Majority Leader Steny H.
Hoyer (D-Md.) said recently. "It's tough in both houses to get
votes."
Democrats, particularly in the House, have voted for politically
costly initiatives at Obama's insistence, most notably health-care
and climate change legislation. But faced with an electorate widely
viewed as angry and hostile to incumbents, many are increasingly
reluctant to take politically unpopular positions.
The House last month stripped Obama's request for $24 billion in
state aid from a bill that would extend emergency benefits for
jobless workers. Senate Majority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.) hopes
to restore that funding but with debate in that chamber set to
resume this week, he acknowledges that he has yet to assemble the
votes for final passage. Obama's request for $23 billion to avert
the layoffs of as many as 300,000 public school teachers has not won
support in either chamber.
Mixed signals
Senior Democratic congressional aides said those initiatives have
not gained traction in part because the White House has not made
additional spending on the economy a clear priority.
In recent weeks, for instance, the White House has appeared more
intent on cutting spending -- threatening to veto a defense bill
over a jet engine project that the Pentagon views as unnecessary and
urging every agency to come up with a list of low-priority programs
for elimination. Obama has also proposed a three-year freeze in
discretionary spending unrelated to national security, an idea
endorsed by leaders of both parties at a meeting at the White House
last week, according to Obama's letter.
With the letter, however, Obama makes a direct and unequivocal case
for additional "targeted investments," including state aid and
several less-expensive initiatives aimed at assisting small
businesses. He specifically calls for passage of the measure that is
before the Senate, which would extend unemployment benefits and
offer states additional aid, increasing deficits by nearly $80
billion over the next decade.
Obama asks lawmakers to be patient on the deficit, noting that a
special commission is at work on a comprehensive deficit-reduction
plan.
"It is essential that we continue to explore additional measures to
spur job creation and build momentum toward recovery, even as we
establish a path to long-term fiscal discipline," Obama wrote. "At
this critical moment, we cannot afford to slide backwards just as
our recovery is taking hold."
In an interview, White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel said the
letter is intended to settle the growing debate over the opposing
priorities of job creation and deficit reduction and "where you put
your thumb on the scale."
"While some people say you have to spend and some people say you
have to cut, the president wants to talk about both cuts and
investing," Emanuel said.
GOP alternative
Don Stewart, a spokesman for Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell
(R-Ky.), called the letter full of "contradictions."
"He's calling on Congress to pass a [jobless] bill that will add
about $80 billion to the deficit, but then calls for fiscal
discipline; he says these measures need to be targeted and
temporary, but then calls for extending programs passed in the
stimulus more than a year ago," Stewart said in an e-mail.
Republicans have offered an alternative package that proposes to
cover the cost of additional jobless benefits -- but not aid to
state governments -- by cutting federal spending elsewhere. In
contrast to the Democratic bill, the GOP measure would reduce
deficits by nearly $55 billion over the next decade, according to
the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office.
The politics of the Democratic bill before the Senate are further
complicated because it has become a grab bag of must-pass
provisions. In addition to state aid and more money for jobless
benefits, it includes a plan to extend $32 billion in expired tax
breaks for individuals and businesses and a separate provision,
known as the "doc fix," that would postpone until 2012 a scheduled
pay cut for doctors who see Medicare patients.
When it was first unveiled last month, the total cost of the package
approached $200 billion, with only about $50 billion paid for
through higher taxes on multinational corporations, hedge fund
managers and certain small businesses. Conservative Democrats in the
House balked, forcing House leaders to scale back the doc fix and
strip out the state aid, as well as $6 billion in health insurance
subsidies for jobless workers. In the letter, Obama asks Congress to
reconsider that decision. The House narrowly approved the
trimmed-down bill.
Now the Senate is struggling to assemble a 60-vote coalition for the
measure. Reid moved last week to restore the state aid, but the CBO
said the resulting measure would add nearly $80 billion to budget
deficits over the next decade. Moderates objected, saying they could
not support such a big increase in borrowing at a time when the
total national debt has topped $13 trillion, nearly 90 percent of
the gross domestic product.
On Saturday, as Obama called for urgent action, senior Senate aides
said the scramble for votes would delay final action on the bill for
at least another week.
State House News Service
Monday, June 14, 2010
Frank "optimistic" about Fed health care funds
By Kyle Cheney
House Speaker Robert DeLeo said Monday the potential loss of nearly
$700 million in expected federal aid for the fiscal year that begins
in two weeks has forced budget-writing maneuvers unlike any he has
seen in his 20-year tenure on Beacon Hill.
Capitol Hill decisions that have put the funding in jeopardy have
prompted state budget writers to “start taking a look at
alternatives to our budget,” DeLeo said, adding that if uncertainty
around the funding continues, “We’ll just have to do the budget
without it and move on.”
“One thing I learned very clearly when I was chair of Ways and
Means: until I see the money – then we can relax a little bit,” he
said. “As of right now, it’s a concern.”
DeLeo said the federal funds, once deemed a sure bet by Beacon Hill
policymakers and baked into spending plans by Patrick, the House and
the Senate, may still come through and that “our information out of
Washington has been good.”
At issue is extended federal Medicaid assistance that legislative
budget writers built into their budget proposals, assuming Congress
would approve it before the new fiscal year begins on July 1. But
Capitol Hill lawmakers balked at the price tag of a bill that
included the Medicaid funds and stripped the Medicaid provision out,
leaving budget writers in Massachusetts and 30 other states
scrambling, and critics second-guessing the decision to presume the
funds were assured.
DeLeo told reporters he spoke to U.S. Rep. Barney Frank on Sunday
and that Frank “feels we’re going in the right direction,” in terms
of obtaining the funding.
“I think he was realistic,” DeLeo said. “I think he feels optimistic
that everyone seems to want to get it done, but the point of the
matter is it’s not. It’s not done.”
In a phone interview Monday, Frank said he spoke to DeLeo at a
Sunday fundraiser for Rep. Kay Khan (D-Newton), telling the speaker
he was “optimistic” about winning the Medicaid funds. Frank said he
told DeLeo that Speaker Nancy Pelosi was “determined” to pass a bill
with the Medicaid funding.
Frank said the unexpected move by the House to strip the Medicaid
funds was a result of concerns by his colleagues about the size of
the federal deficit. He added, however, that many of the same
lawmakers “think we can keep pouring money into Iraq and
Afghanistan.”
“I wish people who were concerned with the deficit would say let’s
get out of Iraq right now,” he said. “That’s a great inconsistency I
find.”
DeLeo also said he and Gov. Deval Patrick recently talked with U.S.
Sen. Scott Brown and urged him to support the Medicaid funds in a
Senate proposal expected to emerge this week.
“I think he understood it. I think he appreciated it,” DeLeo said.
The House and Senate’s chief budget writers have also reached out to
Brown, sending their former colleague a letter urging him to support
the funds.
Describing deep cuts lawmakers have made to state-funded programs,
but omitting any mention of the $1 billion tax increase they backed
in 2009, House Ways and Means Chairman Charles Murphy and Senate
Ways and Means Chairman Steven Panagiotakos warned of “substantial
cuts” that Massachusetts and about 30 other states would have to
make if the federal funds don’t come through.
“We tried to just set up the reality of the situation,” said
Panagiotakos in a phone interview Friday. He said “tens upon tens of
thousands” of people would lose services if the funds did not arrive
and predicted “very large job losses both in state government and in
the non-profit sector.”
Brown has previously said he can’t support a bill currently pending
in the U.S. Senate that would extend the funding because it contains
other provisions that would increase federal spending.
Murphy and Panagiotakos described in detail the “spending reduction
and controls” they implemented during the previous two fiscal years,
but they eschewed any mention of the 25 percent sales tax increase
that Brown voted against as a state senator in 2009. They also left
out the implementation of a 6.25 percent sales tax on alcohol and
increases in corporate and cigarette taxes that took effect in 2008.
The funds Massachusetts lawmakers are seeking would come from a
six-month extension of a program that originated in the 2009
stimulus act, currently set to expire in December. While the federal
government normally picked up 50 percent of states’ Medicaid tab,
the stimulus law increased the federal government’s share to 62
percent.
Gov. Deval Patrick has told lawmakers that if the federal funding
extension falls through, he recommends cutting all budget items --
except for unrestricted local aid, local education aid and mandatory
debt service payments -- by 3.6 percent.
While the budget is still being negotiated in the Legislature, Rep.
Karyn Polito (R-Shrewsbury), a candidate for state treasurer, urged
Gov. Deval Patrick to implement his proposed cuts immediately.
“My advice to the Governor is to go ahead and make the budget cut
whether or not additional federal funding is forthcoming,” she said
in a statement issued by her campaign. “I make this recommendation
because next year's budget is going to be the worst we've seen in
recent memory, with an opening deficit of more than $2 billion. It
will make our current budget difficulties seem like a walk in the
park. Making cuts now will prepare us for the necessary and hard
decisions that are sure to follow.”
The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, a [liberal] national
think tank, estimated last week that if Congress opts against
adopting the Medicaid funding extension and the governor’s proposed
cuts took effect, 1,750 children could lose access to child care and
100 shelter beds for homeless residents would be lost. The state’s
Medicaid program, MassHealth, would be cut by $350 million,
according to the Center.
The Massachusetts House and Senate on Monday passed a $204 million
spending bill that features $162 million for MassHealth.
The Boston Globe
Tuesday, June 15, 2010
A Boston Globe editorial
Despite deficit worry, Congress should give more aid to states
News that retail sales dropped unexpectedly in May leaves little
doubt that an anemic recovery with few jobs remains the major threat
to the economy — greater even than a yawning federal deficit.
Congress should act accordingly by passing a $24 billion measure
extending federal assistance to states, which have suffered from
plunging tax revenues. Should the extension fail, Massachusetts will
have to cut another $700 million from its budget. Here, as in other
states, a new round of layoffs would be the almost certain result.
Deficit hawks make a reasonable case that it’s time for the federal
government to start thinking about its own budget, but there are
other ways in which they can make a stand.
If the federal aid does not come through, Governor Patrick has said
he favors a 3.6 percent cut in all state departments, while schools
and aid to towns and cities are exempted. The chairman of the state
Senate Ways and Means Committee, Steven Panagiotakos, goes further,
saying there would be no exemptions if the state faces loss of the
aid. “If you’re going to cut $700 million more, the cuts are going
to come from everywhere.’’
To be sure, Congress itself has to strike a delicate balance:
Provide enough stimulus to avoid prolonging the economic downturn
without making creditors doubt the nation’s ability or willingness
to repay its debts. The state’s 10 Democratic representatives and
Senator John Kerry have come down firmly on the side of state aid.
Republican Senator Scott Brown, who cites “deficit spending that is
putting future generations of Americans in a deep hole,’’ has
opposed the additional funding.
Brown and other fiscal conservatives can play a productive role not
by blocking stimulus dollars that are needed now, but by looking for
ways to use federal money to promote efficiency at all levels of
government. Prodded by the Obama administration’s “Race to the Top’’
grant competition, Massachusetts and other states enacted education
reforms that teachers unions long resisted. The initiative could be
a model for structural reforms in other aspects of state and local
government; unaffordable public pensions, for instance, aren’t
unique to Massachusetts.
In the meantime, the economy remains sluggish now. Federal Reserve
Chairman Ben Bernanke shares Brown’s worry about long-term deficits,
but told Congress, “This very moment is not the time to radically
reduce our spending or raise our taxes, because the economy is still
in a recovery mode and needs that support.’’ Bernanke, a student of
the Great Depression, knows what he’s saying.
The Boston Herald
Tuesday, June 15, 2010
Teacher ‘emergency’ must alarm taxpayers
By Ben Boychuk
We live in an era of crushing debt, generational theft and too big
to fail, but even the spendthrifts in Congress couldn’t quite bring
themselves to borrow another $23 billion to prop up bloated state
education bureaucracies and teacher unions for another year. Not
that they won’t keep trying.
In the past week, U.S. Education Secretary Arne Duncan, Sen. Tom
Harkin (D-Iowa), and Reps. George Miller (D-Calif.) and David Obey
(D-Wis.) have taken to the airwaves and oped pages to plead for the
Keep Our Educators Working Act, an “emergency” education spending
bill. But merely calling something an “emergency” does not relieve
lawmakers of the responsibility to exercise fiscal restraint.
This new bailout proposal is more evidence of the sham that was last
year’s $787 billion economic stimulus package. It included $100
billion for education. States proceeded to spend that one-time money
on continuing expenses - mostly pay, benefits and pensions for
school personnel. With stimulus money dwindling and thousands of
teachers facing layoffs, states are begging Washington for more
cash.
The Keep Our Educators Working Act proves yet again how “one-time”
spending becomes the new baseline budget. Washington already plans
to spend more than $44 billion on elementary and secondary education
this coming fiscal year, but the bill’s proponents say that isn’t
nearly enough.
If more money really bought better results, we would have the
world’s best-educated citizenry. Local, state and federal education
spending in 2009 topped $667 billion, up from $553 billion three
years earlier. Spending on K-12 education rose by 32 percent
(adjusted for inflation) between 1998 and 2008, thanks to No Child
Left Behind and higher state expenditures fueled by capital gains
tax revenues from the housing bubble.
Total K-12 enrollment grew less than 1 percent a year over the same
period. In some states, such as New York, enrollment actually fell
during the decade-long hiring boom. Yet student proficiency in
reading, math and civics has been stagnant since 1998, according to
the National Assessment of Educational Progress.
Duncan says that without the $23 billion infusion, 100,000 to
300,000 public school jobs could be lost and students could lose
their “favorite teachers.”
In fact the word “educators” in the bill’s title is instructive. The
bill doesn’t require the money be spent on teachers, much less
address the problem of “last-hired, first-fired,” which puts
seniority over quality. It’s a payoff to state bureaucracies and the
public-employee unions that own them.
Ignore the fear-mongering. If the national teacher unions and their
state and local affiliates would compromise on wages, benefits and
pensions, layoffs would be unnecessary. Instead, the unions insist
on contracts that would be rejected out of hand by any private firm,
oppose merit pay and tenure reforms that foster competition and
reward excellence, and maintain an iron grip on budgeting by
contributing millions of dollars to toadying pols.
Ben Boychuk is managing editor of The Heartland Institute’s
School Reform News.
The Boston Herald
Tuesday, June 15, 2010
A Boston Herald editorial
Bonanza of billions
The president is asking Congress to support billions in new
emergency federal spending to prop up the nation’s economy and keep
hundreds of thousands of teachers, cops and firefighters from losing
their jobs.
That’s right, folks - it’s Groundhog Day in the nation’s capital!
This time, however, the appetite for spending borrowed billions
isn’t what it was a year ago, even among Democrats in Congress. You
know the mood is different when a top House Democrat acknowledges
that American taxpayers have a case of “spending fatigue.”
House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer’s statement of the obvious came
Sunday, a day after President Barack Obama urged passage of another
$50 billion in borrowing to bail out state and local governments.
Roughly half the funds would be used to avoid teacher layoffs (a few
billion for cops and firefighters, too), while $25 billion would be
used to compensate states for additional Medicaid costs.
Specifically the president called for passage of a broader Senate
jobs bill which is a stew of Democratic priorities - including an
extension of jobless benefits as well as the aid to states.
It’s the bill U.S. Sen. Scott Brown has come under withering fire
for opposing because it does not seek spending offsets - the one the
Congressional Budget Office estimates would add $80 billion to the
deficit.
On Friday top budget-writers here in Massachusetts wrote to Brown
imploring him to support the additional funds, banking as they did
on $700 million in anticipated Medicaid assistance to build next
year’s budget. Without the additional aid the fiscal 2011 budget,
now being finalized, will be cut to ribbons, they said. And it
wasn’t just on Beacon Hill where chickens were being counted before
the hatch - 31 states are in this predicament.
Hoyer on Sunday said that Congress should consider redirecting
unspent funds from last year’s stimulus to assist states. Once we
get past the shock that such funds exist, we have to conclude that
at least for the Medicaid bailout it is better than the alternative
- more whistling past the deficit graveyard.
The Boston Herald
Monday, June 14, 2010
Hacks stretch Bunker Hill into blowout
By Hillary Chabot
Days before they get to clock out for Bunker Hill Day, state
employees are flocking to Cape Cod’s windswept dunes this week for a
three-day beach blanket bonanza at a ritzy Yarmouth ocean-front
resort. They’ll sip Chardonnay at an all-expenses paid banquet - all
while earning taxpayer-funded paychecks.
The sea-sprayed DOR bash, followed by Bunker Hill Day Thursday,
comes as a glut of Beacon Hill stalwarts hit the road for an early
vacation despite an ongoing fiscal crisis. Senate President Therese
Murray will powwow with officials about the 100th anniversary of the
ill-fated Titanic’s wreck during her week-long trip to Ireland.
“Massachusetts is sinking like the Titanic and the Democrats are on
vacation. June and July are for junkets if you get paid by the
taxpayers,” said outraged Massachusetts Republican Party chairwoman
Jennifer Nassour.
The upcoming activities include:
A barbecue blowout attended by state Department of Revenue employees
at the Red Jacket Inn at a Massachusetts Municipal Accountants and
Assessor’s Association convention featuring nightly cocktail hours
and surf and turf dinners.
A week-long “economic development” trip to Ireland for Murray along
with Sen. Joan Menard and staffers. Murray will dine with executives
from Finland and Spain at the palatial Culloden Estate in Belfast
tonight. She’ll meet with former Boston Police Commissioner Kathleen
O’Toole Thursday and meet with officials from the Titanic Quarter -
a Belfast development where the Titanic set sail - on Wednesday.
Lawmakers and other state workers have Bunker Hill Day off Thursday,
a so-called “hack” holiday only celebrated in Suffolk County.
“We’ve still got a financial crisis on our hands and a lot of
important legislation to hash out with very little time before the
end of the session,” said Rep. Lewis Evangelidis (R-Holden). “I find
it astonishing that people are going on vacation - and the Bunker
Hill holiday just adds insult to injury.”
Department of Revenue spokesman Robert Bliss defended the Cape Cod
event as a development conference where DOR officials help guide
municipal accountants and assessors.
“They won’t have time to feel the sand between their toes,” said
Bliss, who said taxpayers will pick up the employees’ travel costs.
The MMAAA pays for any meals and overnight lodging of the state
employees, said treasurer Donna M. Walsh.
Murray is using a combination of campaign and personal cash to fund
her trip to Ireland, said spokesman David Falcone in an e-mail. She
is discussing preparations for the anniversary of the Titanic’s
sinking because a member of the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution
discovered the wreck.
But the trips provide Republicans with plenty of fodder as they
hungrily eye legislative seats this election year.
“It’s apparent that one-party rule on Beacon Hill has lead to more
than one party outside of Boston - from the sandy beaches of Cape
Cod to the cozy pubs of Ireland,” said Rob Willington, a former
operative for U.S. Sen. Scott Brown (R-Wrentham). “Unfortunately,
while the Beacon Hill politicians escape to Cape Cod and Ireland,
too many working families of Massachusetts are struggling in this
economy and just looking for a job.”
The Boston Herald
Tuesday, June 15, 2010
Robert DeLeo, Murray on hot seat for ‘hack’ holiday excursions
The Battle of Bunker Hill
By Hillary Chabot
House Speaker Robert DeLeo will spend Bunker Hill Day Thursday plus
Friday on a two-day jaunt in sunny Chesapeake Bay - cracking crabs
and rubbing elbows with baseball Hall of Famer Cal Ripken Jr. as the
Winthrop Democrat joins other state workers looking to double their
fun this “hack” holiday.
News of DeLeo’s plan to show up at a national speakers’ convention
comes after the Herald disclosed yesterday that Department of
Revenue employees intend to parlay their special day off, enjoyed
only in Suffolk County, into a three-day Cape Cod beach blast at an
oceanfront resort - on taxpayer time.
Republicans instantly mocked DeLeo for taking the much-maligned
holiday off and fleeing the State House during a fiscal crisis as
the state budget deadline looms.
“He should take the lead and demonstrate a willingness to challenge
the status quo,” said Rep. Karyn Polito (R-Shrewsbury), who is
running for state treasurer. “These holidays represent a major
disconnect between how government is functioning and what people are
facing.”
The biannual National Speakers Conference in Annapolis will feature
a crab feast at Fort McHenry in Baltimore and a black-tie dinner at
the governor’s mansion. Ripken, the legendary Baltimore Orioles
shortstop, will be featured as a special speaker.
DeLeo spokesman Seth Gitell said DeLeo will spend Thursday and
Friday working with other state speakers to secure $600 million in
federal funding currently at risk in Congress. DeLeo is using
campaign funds to pay for the trip.
DeLeo made a point of letting the public know he was working
Evacuation Day, celebrated only three months ago on March 17, but
kept quiet about his two-day trip until asked yesterday.
He also waffled when asked if the controversial holidays will get
the ax after the state Senate voted to eliminate the days off last
month.
“I’m uncertain right now as we’re standing here whether it will be
part of the final (budget),” DeLeo said yesterday.
Gov. Deval Patrick said earlier this year he would support getting
rid of both holidays - Bunker Hill Day on June 17 and Evacuation Day
on March 17.
Senate President Therese Murray is also away this week in Ireland -
dining at a five-star hotel and attending a meeting about the
upcoming 100th anniversary of the storied Titanic shipwreck. She is
paying for the trip using campaign funds and her own cash.
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