Posted March 8th, 2010 5:59 am

The Kentucky state House of Representatives has passed a budget bill. Jack Brammer has the facts, and Larry Dale Keeling has the opinions.

The House voted largely along party lines Thursday to approve a bill that would raise more than $300 million to help balance the next two-year state budget.
House Speaker Greg Stumbo indicated soon after the 64-36 vote on House Bill 530 that those who supported the revenue measure will be rewarded with job-producing building projects in their districts.
“We believe this is a fairly good indicator of members who have concerns about jobs in their communities,” said Stumbo, D-Prestonsburg. “Those members who indicated that is a priority for them stepped up today and voted for the measure, and we certainly want to respond and try to create as many jobs as we possibly can across the commonwealth.”
Stumbo said House Democratic leadership hopes to release an “aggressive” jobs-creation package focusing on schools, roads and infrastructure Friday or Monday as part of a nearly $18 billion spending plan for the state during the next two years, beginning July 1.
All Democrats in the House except Reps. Jim Wayne of Louisville and Will Coursey of Benton voted for the revenue-producing bill. The only House Republican who voted for it was Rep. Jim Stewart III of Flat Lick.
House Minority Leader Jeff Hoover, R-Jamestown, said the bill was designed to raise a surplus of about $100 million “for pet projects.”
On Wednesday, he said Republicans would vote against the “tax increases” because they’re more concerned about “being fiscally responsible during these economic times” than snagging government building projects.
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Wayne, a Democrat who voted against the bill, said he was disappointed that tax reform was not implemented to fix major problems in the state. He mentioned children living in poverty, higher college tuition rates and high incidences of cancer and heart disease.
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The bulk of the revenue to help balance the budget comes from two big items — accelerating sales tax collections in the second year of the budget and suspending for two years a tax provision that lets businesses deduct net operating losses over 20 years.
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Stumbo said $30 million will be realized through decreasing the number of state prisoners by about 2,000 during the next two years. He said they will be Class D, non-violent offenders.
The House revenue bill now goes to the Senate for its consideration. It is expected to make changes to the proposal and to the spending bill that emerges from the House. The two chambers then would appoint a committee to iron out their differences.

Meanwhile for some reason, Larry Dale Keeling has grown a bit cynical over the years. An occupational hazard, most likely.

FRANKFORT — “This has been an amazing budget process,” state Rep. Harry Moberly opined Thursday during floor debate on House Bill 530, which would generate an estimated $371 million in additional revenue to help balance the next two-year state budget.
Note the use of the term “additional revenue” rather than (Horrors!) “new taxes.”
After all, proponents of HB 530 assure us — without even the hint of a wink or a smile — that it does not raise existing taxes or impose new taxes. It just magically generates extra cash, and that truly is “amazing.”
OK, truth in punditry notice: Unlike me, Moberly wasn’t being facetious when he described the process as amazing. The Richmond Democrat who formerly chaired the Appropriations and Revenue Committee went on to say HB 530 and the budget to come, which few have seen yet, represent one of the “highlights in the history of the House of Representatives.”
I, on the other hand, freely admit to harboring a healthy dose of skepticism about every aspect of the House budget process. (And an even healthier dose of skepticism about HB 530 being able to work all of its revenue-producing magic once the Republican-controlled Senate gets through with it.)
Start with the fact that the revenue portion of this two-step dance came first.
Ostensibly, a court ruling led to separation of the revenue and spending portions of the budget process. Skeptic that I am, though, I can’t help but note how conveniently that worked out for House Democratic leaders. They got to see who among the congregation sided with the angels on revenue before distributing the manna from heaven in the “jobs program” portion of the spending plan.
In case you haven’t paid attention during these recessionary times, “jobs program” has become the politically correct term for what used to be called “projects” or, in a more vulgar vernacular, “pork.”
These days, lawmakers don’t bring home the bacon. They create jobs that put people back to work. If the result of this labor oinks a bit, well, that’s the redeye gravy on the country ham.
Gov. Steve Beshear’s short-lived budget proposal contained a $1.8 billion “jobs program.” Look for the House version to be similar in scope but not in the details.
For instance, about half of Beshear’ proposal would have funded the top capital priorities of the eight state universities and the Kentucky Community and Technical College System. But why waste all that money on a few buildings for the academic crowd when it could finance hundreds upon hundreds of miniature “bridge to nowhere” equivalents back home in House members’ districts?
Besides, who really cares about preparing the state’s young ’uns to compete in a high-tech global economy? If we do that, they may start believing in fantasies such as “climate change.” Gotta protect them from that awful fate.
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But a good chunk of the remaining $1.61 billion represents assumed savings, including assumed savings in the next biennium of $730 million due to Medicaid efficiencies, $151 million due to changes in health insurance and $30 million from releasing non-violent felons from incarceration.
Assumptions are iffy things, however, and particularly so when referring to Medicaid “efficiencies.” While that’s a familiar tune in the halls of state government, humming it on key can be a difficult task.
Even if all these assumptions work out, it seems a bit disingenuous for House leaders to claim they are heroically “plugging the leaky bucket.” They are merely setting goals with these assumptions.
In essence, then, they are handing the leaky bucket to the Beshear administration and saying, “Here, get out the caulking and make it happen.”
Hmm. Now that I think about it, budgetary magic isn’t all that amazing when you leave the heavy lifting to others.

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