Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, February 8, 1991 TAG: 9102080714
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A-10 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE:
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
In ordinary times in a mid-biennium session such as this, differences between a governor's proposals and those of the General Assembly's money committees are usually marginal. Typically, the main task is to set the second-year pay raise for state workers on the basis of higher revenue projections than had been (under)estimated 12 months earlier at the start of the biennium.
This year is different. Each revenue projection is lower than the one before; a furlough policy, not a pay raise, is the topic of debate; there's none of the extra money to be "found" by the General Assembly for projects of special interest to influential legislators.
And the House and Senate budgets differ from Gov. Wilder's proposals on several important points. The fundamental issue at stake: At what point do cutbacks in state services to offset revenue shortfalls cause more harm than good?
So far, none of the players - not the governor, not the Senate, not the House - has shown the courage to take seriously the idea of a tax increase.
For example, Fincastle Sen. Dudley Emick's reasonable proposal to increase the sales tax by a half-cent - earmarked for schools and coupled with a mandate that local districts cut administrative staff by 5 percent - was dead on arrival. Why?
Meanwhile, both the Senate and House budgets would allow the state's colleges and universities to raise tuition and fees. That will only partially ease the continuing starvation of academic quality in Virginia.
The General Assembly's plans reflect a somewhat retributive desire to assert independence from a governor who has kept budget-making close to his vest. The House's effort to regulate the governor's use of state aircraft, for example, has the look of mean-spirited and demagogic politics.
In other respects, though, hard times are usefully enhancing the legislature's role as watchdog on the executive. One budget proposal requires the administration to make plans for repaying the $95 million "borrowed" this year from the transportation fund. Both budget versions would require a higher selling price for granting the state pension fund clear title to state-owned stock in the RF&P Corp.
As a matter of principle, the most important development may be the aim taken by both House and Senate budgets at the governor's $200-million "rainy day" reserve.
The House plan keeps the full reserve for now, but says it must be spent before state workers can be furloughed. The Senate plan is more direct: To restore some of Wilder's proposed cuts in school money, the Senate would cut the reserve in half.
For Wilder, his creation and maintenance of a rainy-day fund provide a good talking point for demonstrating fiscal conservatism. In sunny weather, building and clutching tight to such a reserve is a worthy idea on its own merits.
But the Senate is on the right track. When public schools must take cuts in appropriations that already are too low, the rainy day is here. Depleting half the reserve seems appropriate. At the least, straightforward spending from the rainy-day fund is better than engaging in accounting gimmicks that can only grow more dubious.
When the reserve was established last year, it was thought, the money might have to go for court-ordered repayment of state-income taxes previously levied on federal retirees. The possibility still lurks.
If that happens and, with the reserve depleted, a tax increase is required - well, at least it will bring home to other Virginians the truth that one person's tax break is another taxpayer's burden.
by CNB