Trimming the state's budget for tough times

We are at the mid-point in our state legislative session in Boise. Most legislative sessions here in Idaho run from early January to late March. Introduction of legislation for consideration is complete except for budget bills and bills that House and Senate leadership feel are important to be heard in what remains of the session. A complete list of bills can be found at www.legislature.idaho.gov and also on that site you can link to audio and visual streaming of House and Senate Floor and Committee sessions.

This past week the budget committee — JFAC — set the number for our state general fund budget for the Fiscal Year of 2012 which begins July 1. Our best guess is that we will collect about $ 2.3 billion in taxes from Idahoans that we will divvy up amongst the state programs Idahoans have come to expect. The biggest part of our tax dollar — about half — goes to the K-12 education system and when colleges and universities are added about two-thirds of our budget goes to education. The next biggest piece is our Medicaid budget that provides medical services to needy and vulnerable Idahoans. Then it’s prisons and after that everything else — state police, environmental monitoring and regulation and others.

Since 2008, we have cut 27 percent of our budget or $645 million. We have spent all of our so-called “rainy day” funds. In the years of 2009 and 2010 state employees took unpaid days off — furloughs — for a total of 573,089 hours. So far this year, state employees have taken 78,587 furlough hours. This has saved the taxpayers more than $16 million. School district employees have also taken furlough days and along with state employees many have lost their jobs altogether. We will be cutting budgets again this year and on average those cuts will be about 5 percent or around $ 90 million.

With 70,000 Idahoans out of work, no taxes are expected to be raised. There have been discussions about adding tobacco taxes or beer and wine taxes but no bills have been introduced and at present there does not seem to be wide support for raising taxes let alone on a specific segment of the tax base.

As the budget committee, we will work with the money we feel fairly certain we have so that we do not set false expectations and set the stage for mid-year hold backs. We will do what most of us do with our home check books: pay the bills with the money we have and cut our spending while at the same time prioritizing the needs. For most legislators those needs are: care for those truly not able to care for themselves, public safety and schools.

While the economy and the budget has consumed much of my time as a JFAC member, there are many other issues that are being discussed and debated. As always, feel free to contact me or any of the other area legislators directly (our contact information runs frequently here in the Bee) or through our message center: 1 (800) 626-0471.