Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, February 14, 1991 TAG: 9102140202
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: A-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: ROB EURE POLITICAL WRITER
DATELINE: RICHMOND LENGTH: Long
The House Finance Committee did the same with two Senate proposals to increase business taxes - measures that raise some $56 million for local education in the Senate budget.
All three measures could have helped settle the differences between the House and Senate plans for the $24.6 billion two-year budget. The deadline for negotiators to complete the compromise is next Tuesday.
But neither Van Yahres, D-Charlottesville, nor the Senate sponsors seemed to mind the delays.
"I am now a tool, but it's OK; I understand that," Van Yahres said with a chuckle. "I've lost all control over that bill."
The bills have become "hostages," in the language of the legislature. They are being intentionally held by powerful lawmakers in an annual poker game that stalls all sorts of laws in the final week of the session so they can be used as leverage in the final negotiations.
This year, the only major issue left is the fight over money - a fight that pits the Senate against the House and includes a veto threat from Gov. Douglas Wilder.
"It's all over money this year," said Senate Finance Chairman Hunter Andrews, D-Hampton. "There's no real philosophical difference."
That is not to say that non-money bills have not become hostages. Wednesday, for the fifth day in a row, Andrews held up the final Senate vote on a law creating an instant criminal record check on all gun sales.
The bill is expected to pass the Senate perhaps as early as today. But the bill is of political value to many members of the House of Delegates who voted to kill a three-day waiting period on handgun sales last week, citing the instant background check as a better alternative.
It is also fodder for Sen. Moody Stallings, D-Virginia Beach, who wants to use the background check as leverage to free a gun-control measure he has in a House committee.
Sen. Madison Marye, D-Shawsville, wandered out of the House Finance Committee meeting Wednesday afternoon perplexed about the holdup on his measure establishing a tax amnesty program for Montgomery County.
And Tuesday night, when a bill authored by Del. Richard Cranwell appeared headed for trouble in the Senate Privileges and Elections Committee, Cranwell killed the bill by withdrawing it from the calendar, rather than see it taken hostage.
The real poker will be played over the budget, and among six senior legislators, three from the House Appropriations Committee and three from the Senate finance panel, including Andrews.
The six men will ultimately settle differences between the budgets that amount to about $100 million, or less than 1 percent of the state budget. Even so, not all of that money is actually in contention. Most of it has to do with the amount that the legislature agrees not to spend but to set aside in the so-called "revenue reserve" that Wilder insists on having.
The major difference is in how much money the two houses will send to localities for education. The House has reduced a $151 million cut in local school aid by $40 million, and delegates hope to send another $40 million from the lottery to localities. The Senate plan, based on the two taxes, would offset cuts by $56 million.
So the real hostage items are the two Senate tax bills that sit in the House Finance Committee, chaired by Cranwell, D-Vinton, and the lottery measure in Senate Finance.
The Senate's two business taxes are accounting gimmickry: One delays the depreciation schedule for writing off new machinery; the other advances by 15 days the date when retailers must pay the state the sales tax they collect. Cranwell dislikes both of them. Wilder opposes new taxes, and the General Assembly would rather not defend new taxes during the fall election campaigns anyway.
Andrews said he would keep the lottery measure for a few days to get a financial analysis from his staff. The bill already has a financial impact statement prepared by the state office of planning and budget.
Meanwhile, Wilder is using the threat of a veto of the budget bill to ensure that the General Assembly leaves him $200 million in unappropriated reserves - money he says he must have in case the state's economy sags further.
The stalemate on the money issues is likely to last at least until Monday, less than 24 hours before the budget conferees are scheduled to report their compromise package.
Several senior legislators, including Sen. Dudley Emick, D-Fincastle, are forecasting a deadlock that will send the session beyond its scheduled adjournment of Feb. 23.
"It's boiled down to the same old game," said Del. Earl Dickinson, D-Louisa, one of the House budget conferees.
In normal years, the conferees who negotiate the final budget have some money to shift around - a museum here, a park there - to forge a coalition to pass the budget.
But this year, there is no money to play with, and the conferees have the veto threat to consider when they negotiate the budget.
"That is going to make the conferees be very careful about what compromises are ultimately made to put this budget to sleep," Cranwell said.
Keywords:
GENERAL ASSEMBLY
by CNB