Post by Logan on Apr 10, 2016 3:44:42 GMT -6
As the state budget impasse approaches its second month, I’m struck not only by the lack of progress but seemingly the lack of urgency to get a compromise worked out.
The immovable object in the scenario continues to be the House of Delegates’ refusal to support any revenue increases — even an increase in the tobacco tax, which at 55 cents a pack is the fourth-lowest in the country, so low that it has rightfully been described as a state subsidy for smokers.
With no new revenue — and Gov. Earl Ray Tomblin’s refusal to permit a raid on the state’s Rainy Day reserve funds as a one-time fix to get through the 2016-17 budget — the only option is to cut at least another $238 million out of the 2016-17 budget — further extending the death of a thousand cuts for agencies and institutions that have endured cuts of 20 percent or more over the past three years.
House Finance Chairman Eric Nelson, R-Kanawha, has raised the issue of systemic changes, and that raises some sound points: Is it efficient to have 55 counties and public school systems, or to have town and cities clustered together, but operating independently?
See more at: www.wvgazettemail.com/article-/20160409/statehouse-beat-lack-of-urgency-marks-budget-impasse
The immovable object in the scenario continues to be the House of Delegates’ refusal to support any revenue increases — even an increase in the tobacco tax, which at 55 cents a pack is the fourth-lowest in the country, so low that it has rightfully been described as a state subsidy for smokers.
With no new revenue — and Gov. Earl Ray Tomblin’s refusal to permit a raid on the state’s Rainy Day reserve funds as a one-time fix to get through the 2016-17 budget — the only option is to cut at least another $238 million out of the 2016-17 budget — further extending the death of a thousand cuts for agencies and institutions that have endured cuts of 20 percent or more over the past three years.
House Finance Chairman Eric Nelson, R-Kanawha, has raised the issue of systemic changes, and that raises some sound points: Is it efficient to have 55 counties and public school systems, or to have town and cities clustered together, but operating independently?
See more at: www.wvgazettemail.com/article-/20160409/statehouse-beat-lack-of-urgency-marks-budget-impasse