As groups protest budget cuts that affect everything from higher education to care for the mentally ill, one question hovers over their rallies: Why are those cuts necessary when the overall budget is growing by $500 million?
Even as revenues have plummeted, the state is more than making up for it with money socked away during the prosperous 1990s, allowing expenditures to rise 2 percent.
"For the most part, what we're talking about is cuts in the rates of growth, not cuts in regular dollars," said Stephen Crosby, Acting Governor Jane Swift's budget chief. "We are not cutting in absolute dollars from state government. In fact, it's growing by a lot."
But due to legal obligations, prior commitments, and a consensus that areas such as education and public safety be beefed up, not all parts of the budget got equal treatment. In a rare area of agreement between Swift and legislative leaders, three-fifths of the spending was locked in, at increases far greater than 2 percent. That meant cuts in the other two-fifths -- the part that includes human services -- as the state copes with declining revenue.
Most of those familiar with the budget agree that if this year's additional spending were spread across state government, few areas of services would feel a pinch.
"It's a much tougher exercise than outsiders realize," said Michael J. Widmer, president of the Massachusetts Taxpayers Foundation. "It means that a small fraction of the budget -- in this case, particularly human services -- bears a huge portion of the cuts."
Lawmakers have virtually no control over more than a third of the budget. Many costs -- notably Medicaid, which alone represents a quarter of the state budget and could grow by 15 percent this year -- are legal obligations. State leaders also have little leeway in spending on areas like debt service, payments to the public employees' pension plans, and funding for health insurance for state workers, Widmer said.
Then there are areas that aren't touched because of politics and consensus, he said. The big fish there is K-12 education aid, which virtually everyone on Beacon Hill agreed should be able to grow by 7 percent this year, to $4.2 billion.
Throw on top of that new public safety expenses that have wide support because of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks and there just isn't much room left for budget cutting. That's the main reason the other areas in the budget -- notably human services, higher education, and aid to cities and towns for roads and bridges -- faced large cuts.
"One of the things that's so frustrating when we're looking at such big cuts is that although the budget is so huge, we have a significant portion of the budget that's nondiscretionary," said Senator Mark C. Montigny, chairman of the Senate Ways and Means Committee.
And so this year's toll looks to be brutal in some areas. Nearly $30 million in cuts from the Department of Mental Health could force the closing of psychiatric wards and could send patients into group homes or onto the street.
Mentally retarded adults may not get the nursing care or group-home placement they were promised because of a $22 million cut at the Department of Mental Retardation. And all state-run adult-education programs are in danger of closing at the end of the year because of a $13 million budget reduction.
"We think the pain could have been a little more evenly distributed," said Stephen E. Collins, executive director of the Massachusetts Human Services Coalition. "Human services are always the last expanded and the first cut."
Collins said he realizes that spending reductions are necessary in tight fiscal times. But he's urging the Legislature to look at new revenue sources, like freezing the income tax rollback approved by the voters last year and dipping more deeply into state reserves.
Few in the Legislature are defending individual budget cuts; House and Senate leaders have generally referred to the cuts as painful but necessary. But House Ways and Means Chairman John H. Rogers said that the complaints are a product of expectations that have expanded along with the state budget in recent years.
"The word `cut' hasn't been in the state lexicon for a decade now, so that's why it's such a daunting reality," said Rogers, a Norwood Democrat. "The Commonwealth is on a strict diet. Diets always hurt the most at the beginning."
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State House News Service
Wednesday, November 28, 2001
STATE HOUSE, BOSTON, NOV. 28, 2001 ... In addition to cutting programs that serve the mentally ill, AIDS patients and the mentally retarded, the House also chopped its own budget, cutting office accounts an average of 4 percent. But the Legislature has plenty of money available should they need it.
The House rolled over about $11.9 million in unspent appropriations made in recent years -- to the surprise of some members. The rollovers, known by budget writers as "prior appropriations continued," [PAC] have been curbed over the years, with critics arguing lawmakers should be free to make spending choices each year with all money on the table.
Legislators say imploding tax collections forced them to cut $650 million in state spending. The cuts, along with the drawing of more than $700 million in reserves, were included in a $22.6 billion budget approved on Thanksgiving Eve, less than a day after it was unveiled.
The majority of House accounts were reduced, but accounts for member salaries, travel and expenses, administrative and legislative aides' salaries, and committee services, each received a 2 percent increase.
Father Robert Quinn, the House chaplain, received a 23 percent raise and will now receive $22,822 in compensation. Overall spending in the House will increase from $32.5 million last year, to $33.4 million this year, thanks mainly to a $2.45 million line item funding a major ongoing technology upgrade effort.
Charles Rasmussen, spokesman for House Speaker Thomas Finneran, said the branch's budget was the "bare minimum needed to keep the House operating."
The accounts will be padded, however, with the $11.9 million in leftover money. Rasmussen said the $11.9 million PAC money is there if needed, but it's unclear whether it will actually be used.
Neither State Rep. Jay Kaufman (D-Lexington), nor Rep. Thomas P. Kennedy (D-Brockton), knew about the extra money until they read about it in a Boston Herald story Wednesday morning. Kaufman said he hopes to receive some explanation that would justify rolling over the money when the House discusses budget vetoes at a special session next Wednesday. Kennedy, who said he has received a number of complaints from constituents about a $13 million cut in adult education programs, said he also wanted to find out more about the account before taking a stand one way or the other.
The Senate level-funded its budget at $18,050,619 but has $5.3 million in rolled-over cash available. Alison Franklin, spokeswoman for Senate President Thomas Birmingham, said a "substantial" part of the money will be used to fund the Senate's budget this year. She said the Senate's administrative budget is "responsive" to the tight fiscal times, level-funded for the eighth straight year, and curtails hiring, raises, interns, renovations and technology improvements.
The Legislature has a total of $22 million in PAC money available, including $3.6 million in legislative accounts. The reserves make available an additional $340,000 for travel and expense accounts on top of the $1.5 million already allocated, as well as extra money for office repairs, televised session coverage, internship programs and supplies.
Acting Gov. Jane Swift said today that her office has sent back its own $379,000 fiscal 2001 surplus, and hinted she might veto any legislative accounts padded with PAC money. "I think they should definitely live within the appropriations they have agreed on," she said.
Sprinkling a few hints of vetoes to expect later this week, Swift said she is considering cutting her own office budget down to the level she called for in her proposed recovery budget. The move would trim $181,414 from the $5.6 million executive office budget approved by the Legislature, including $34,117 from the governor's commission on mental retardation....
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State House News Service
Wednesday, November 28, 2001
Finneran heads back to court
to explain non-election for Nagle seat
By Helen Woodman
STATE HOUSE, BOSTON, NOV. 28, 2001 ... The next chapter in the novel mystery about an empty House seat once held by Rep. William Nagle of Florence will be written Friday afternoon in a Suffolk Superior Courtroom.
Nagle was serving as House majority leader, or second-in-command to Speaker Thomas Finneran, when he resigned last June to become clerk-magistrate of the Ware District Court. Speculation has abounded since then about why Finneran has declined to schedule an election to pick a Nagle successor. The speaker himself has had nothing to say on the subject, declining to enlighten the curious.
Out in the 1st Hampshire District, residents are more than curious: they're frustrated and angry. Nearly 40,000 residents of Hatfield, Northampton, Southampton and Westhampton were unrepresented in the House for the past six months. The district has had no voice in recent deliberations over important bills drawing new legislative and congressional districts and making $650 million in state budget cuts.
House and Senate vacancies are typically scheduled soon after a vacancy occurs. It takes 14 weeks from the time a special election is scheduled until it can take place since the law requires that candidates be given time to collect and process nomination signatures and that there be a month between party primaries and the final election.
Exceptions are often made when a seat opens up in the second year of a biennial session. Since formal sessions end in July of the second year and a regular election takes place in November, cities and towns are spared the cost of holding two elections and candidates need not campaign twice in one year.
But Nagle's departure came during the first year of this 2001/2002 session. The failure to set a date to elect his successor and a replacement for another member, Rep. Brian Cresta (R-Wakefield) who left the House in mid-September, is unusual. It is up to Finneran and Senate President Thomas Birmingham to place before their respective branches orders calling for special elections when vacancies occur and Finneran has already done so to replace members who resigned earlier this year.
As another comparison, US Rep. Joseph Moakley (D-South Boston) died a week before Nagle resigned and Acting Gov. Jane Swift quickly set in motion the process for replacing him. Not only has Moakley's successor, state Sen. Stephen Lynch (D-South Boston), been elected but he's been on the job for more than two months. And a special election has already been set to elect Lynch's successor in the state Senate.
The prolonged and mysterious reluctance of Finneran to do the same and give the 40,000 residents of the 1st Hampshire District a voice at the State House is about to extend into a seventh month. In Boston, the inaction has created ripples in the House itself where Rep. Carol Donovan (D-Woburn) has filed a bill requiring that dates be set for such elections within two weeks of the vacancy.
But out west in Hampshire County, there is a torrent of frustration. Three residents of Nagle's district filed suit Sept. 19 asking the Suffolk Superior Court to make Finneran call for the election. Residents out there aped the Boston Tea Party on Labor Day weekend, dumping tea into the Connecticut River to highlight their claim of "taxation without representation."
Superior Court Judge John C. Cratsley agreed with them. On Oct. 26, he ordered Finneran to place on the House agenda by Dec. 31 an order setting an election date. But Finneran has appealed the judge's order. A hearing on that motion is scheduled for 3 pm this Friday at the Suffolk Superior Courthouse.
Helping Finneran defend against the lawsuit is Assistant Attorney General Daniel J. Hammond who argued in a Nov. 9 brief that, while the Speaker does set the schedule for the House, the House Rules Committee and its Steering and Policy Committee are responsible for determining the flow of matters coming before the body and no member had yet filed an order calling for an election. In the past, the speaker or another member has filed such orders.
Days later, Rep. Ellen Story (D-Amherst) did file an order setting April 2, 2002 as the date to choose a Nagle successor. It was shipped to the House Rules Committee on Nov. 13 and has not surfaced since.
"It's a curious argument," said Amherst attorney Peter Vickery of Finneran's insistence that his hands are tied until a member files with the House Clerk an order scheduling an election -- and that he has no control over the Rules and Steering and Policy committees since he is neither the chairman or a member of either.
"My job is to prove to the court that while he is not a member of either committee, he does exercise de facto control and that his argument is disingenuous," said Vickery. "In defending against this lawsuit, he's wasting taxpayer money. It's the attorney general who's defending this lawsuit. I'm a taxpayer and that bothers me," said Vickery who's handling the case for the plaintiffs on a pro bono basis, "and it bothers a lot of other people."
If Judge Cratsley denies Finneran's request to reconsider his order and the speaker still refuses to place the election order before the House for a vote, then he would be considered in contempt of court, Vickery explained. But Vickery said it would be up to the plaintiffs to bring the contempt charges to the court and the attorney did not know whether they would take their case any farther.
Vickery doesn't speculate about Finneran's reasons for failing to call an election, nor does Peter Kocot, who was a Nagle aide for 20 years and is considering a run for the seat. Others have -- especially out in the 1st Hampshire District.
"Finneran may be dragging his feet on setting a date to even some political score," reads an editorial in the Daily Hampshire Gazette, "or he may simply be stalling simply because he can. The reason does not matter. His behavior is a dereliction of his duties and shows an arrogance and disregard for voters that has no place in out Legislature."
The newspaper last week invited readers to write or email the speaker with their own thoughts. Meanwhile, Finneran has remained silent about his motives. Finneran will be in Miami Friday as head of the National Speaker's Conference. Swift meanwhile will preside over a ceremonial swearing in ceremony for Nagle in Northampton Friday. Finneran plans to send Nagle a congratulatory note.
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The Hampshire Gazette
Northampton, Mass.
Monday, November 19, 2001
Editorial
Democracy hijacked
It is obvious that House Speaker Thomas Finneran simply does not want the 1st Hampshire District seat in the Legislature to be filled.
That is the only possible explanation for his continued obstinacy in setting a special election to name a successor to William P. Nagle Jr. Nagle stepped down in June, 169 days ago today, to become clerk magistrate of Ware District Court. Since then an arrogant Finneran has been unresponsive to requests that he set a date for the election. In the meantime, the residents of Northampton, Hatfield, Southampton and Westhampton have been denied their right of representation on Beacon Hill.
The first real movement to regain representation was spurred by a lawsuit filed against Finneran by three Northampton residents. They prevailed last month, when Suffolk Superior Court Judge John C. Cratsley ordered Finneran to put the election on the Legislature's agenda by the end of the year.
Finneran, in his first response of any kind on this issue, appealed the ruling on grounds that he could not set a date until a member of the House filed an order calling for an election. That is nonsense. In putting forward such a specious excuse, Finneran has dropped any remaining pretense of legitimacy.
State Rep. Ellen Story, D-Amherst, no friend of Finneran, has dutifully filed the order, which probably will not have any effect. It is common knowledge that nothing happens in the House without Finneran's approval, and the chairman of the House Rules Committee, which must act on the order, is a trusted Finneran ally.
We have often noted the problems associated with granting too much power to one person in what is supposed to be a democratic institution. Early this year House members caved in to Finneran and voted to drop the eight-year term limit on the speakership. The hijacking of democracy in the 1st Hampshire District underscores the danger of making Finneran "speaker for life." It is one thing for the speaker to block a project that would benefit a district, but to stubbornly deny residents of a district any representation goes beyond the pale. Anyone who is not outraged by this situation is not paying attention.
Clearly we cannot leave a decision of this importance to the whims of a single politician. We must have an established protocol, including reasonable deadlines, for setting special elections. Rep. Carol Donovan, D-Woburn, has filed a bill that would require that special elections be held no more than 31/2 months after a vacancy occurs. Without such a law, the injustice being done to residents of the 1st Hampshire District undoubtedly will be repeated.
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