Cut it Out
Senate Majority Leader Russ Decker, D-Schofield, said he wants to scrap the transfer of $200 million from a fund to pay medical malpractice claims that exceed insurance limits and instead impose a $418 million tax on hospitals.
Or… here’s a silly thought… how about we scrap the unconstitutional raid of the PCF and just cut spending by $200 million? Any takers? Heck, I’ll even propose a place to do it. How about we cut $25 million from the DNR, $100 million from K-12, $1 million from the governor’s office, $10 million from the legislature, $20 million from UW, and $44 million from transportation? After all, it represents less than a 1% cut in the proposed general fund spending and less than 0.5% of total state government spending. Heck, that doesn’t get us to the level of spending less than in the last budget - not even close. Everybody still gets more money, just not as much of an increase as they would have liked.
Any takers? Cut spending? Yes? No?
I could agree with that, but here’s one problem: For each of the areas you describe cuts for you just lost more than enough votes to lose the election you would have to win to even have the smallest input on the decision. So sounds good, but the stance doesn’t make you very electable. But that is good since you always say you won’t run.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on October 29, 2007 at 1814 hrs
Exactly. I’m not interested in getting elected. I’m interested in good policy.
Posted by Owen on October 29, 2007 at 1834 hrs
Owen, you’re trying to inject common sense where there is none. Cut it out!
Posted by Kate on October 29, 2007 at 1855 hrs
So you want to cut education more than roads? Hows this cut the $400 from highway building.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on October 29, 2007 at 1927 hrs
This is only general revenue portion of the budget. We spend less than $200 million of general revenue funds on transportation, and most of that is to pay employees of the DOT. The rest is in the transportation fund.
I can’t cut $200 million out of transportation because that wouldn’t help offset the canceling of the PCF raid.
By contrast, K-12 is well over $10 Billion of general revenue spending.
That being said, I have said in the past that I think we could cut $1 billion out of transportation without breaking a sweat.
Posted by Owen on October 29, 2007 at 1944 hrs
Everybody still gets more money, just not as much of an increase as they would have liked.
I’m curious as to what kind of comparison we’re making here. Is this the same kind of “increase” that Bush proposes for S-CHIP? The kind where fewer kids get covered than before?
I keep thinking about the amount of money going to pay our incredibly high health benefits here in the US. If we could stop that going out of control maybe we really could save some money.
Posted by scott on October 29, 2007 at 1959 hrs
I would love nothing more, Owen, than for you to obtain copies of the Assembly and Senate budgets from the Chief Clerks of those houses and tell us how you plan to cut $10 million on top of the $6 million I believe they’re asked to lapse back to the general fund. Believe it or not, the Legislature is probably one of the more efficient units of government.
I get what you’re saying, and I don’t disagree with you in a general sense. But when it comes to the details, you’re talking out of the wrong end of the alimentary canal again. Did you even write this with a cognizance of what the Legislature’s budget is, or are the details too much work around here?
Posted by Recess Supervisor on October 29, 2007 at 2038 hrs
Well then there is something we can agree on. Lets cut that 1 Billion out of road building.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on October 29, 2007 at 2136 hrs
I pulled up the budget that actually passed (as amended) and pulled out of the line items.
So what would you cut, since you don’t disagree with me in the general sense? Or are the details too much to work around here?
Posted by Owen on October 29, 2007 at 2138 hrs
You know, I won’t profess to be able to tell you. When I say that I agree with you in a general sense, I’m saying that I can appreciate your sentiment for wanting to control spending. I don’t have nearly a detailed enough knowledge of programs and agency spending patterns to target cuts, and I’m not going to pretend to be smarter than I am. It’s irresponsible and harmful to the debate to simply pull numbers out of a hat (or other places) and make it sound like a piece of cake.
But you, however, seem to think you can narrow it down agency by agency. And so I’m asking you to put your money where your mouth is. Otherwise, just stick to carping on the general level. Pretending to know the details without actually knowing them will only get you, or me, or anyone, in trouble. And that’s why I don’t pretend and stick to talking about the things I actually understand.
Or maybe you do really have a Bob Lang-esque knowledge of spending?
Posted by Recess Supervisor on October 29, 2007 at 2159 hrs
Cut $100 million from K-12? You’re not serious…
If the state were to have cut $100 million from K-12, it would have failed to provide the per-pupil increase in spending specified in the statutes. Under current law, school boards have authority to increase property taxes by the amount that the state fails to provide.
So, even if you were to cut $100 million from K-12, shift those GPR funds to some other purpose, and reduce the raid on the Injured Patients and Families Compensation Fund (IPFCF), you would be increasing local property taxes, perhaps by as much as $100 million.
Not a good idea.
Take $44 million from transportation? From where? Highway construction costs are typically bonding. (You can’t use those for some other purpose!) And nobody wants cuts in DMV service centers…wait times are already too long.
I suppose you could postpone the implementation of Real ID ($20 million), eliminate local road aids for two years ($30 million), or maybe discontinue mass transit assistance altogether ($12 million). But even if you do that, those monies remain segregated in the Transportation Fund. They shouldn’t be raided to be allocated to some non-transportation purpose.
I appreciate serious attempts to cut spending. But the meat cleaver approach just doesn’t cut it.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on October 29, 2007 at 2209 hrs
How about selling land- the state has so much land and continues to buy more. Stop buying land and taking the money off the tax rolls and sell some land and put that land back on the tax rolls.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on October 29, 2007 at 2340 hrs
I agree with you Dan that the state is probably buying more land than it should be. However, all of the land buying done through Stewardship is done through bonding. And if we sell the land, we’d have to pay off the bond first. It’d sort of be like selling a home a couple of years after taking out a 30-year mortgage. The overwhelming majority of the sale proceeds are going to go towards paying off the mortgage. What the state would save on is the payments made to local governments in lieu of taxes that would otherwise be received for the property.
Unless, however, you’re suggesting we start selling off state parks. Most of those are paid for.
And putting land back on the property tax rolls does almost nothing to help the state’s finances. The only revenue the state directly generates via a property tax is the forestry tax, and that’s segregated.
Again, I’m not saying it’s a bad idea in principle. But in the context of this discussion, it’d provide virtually no relief.
Posted by Recess Supervisor on October 30, 2007 at 0113 hrs
I don’t have nearly a detailed enough knowledge of programs and agency spending patterns to target cuts,
Let me get this straight… you have enough detailed knowledge of programs and agency spending to INCREASE spending, but not to cut it? I’m just making sure because you don’t seem to have a problem throwing bigger numbers at various agencies.
Posted by Owen on October 30, 2007 at 0356 hrs
The point, RS, is to BEGIN THE PROCESS of reducing State expenditures.
Another set of reductions should be the entire pack of earmarks—every single dollar.
One can infer from your arguments that you, too, believe that the State’s budgeted expenditures can only rise—NEVER fall.
Wrong.
As to ‘school aid,’ if MPS intends to spend far more than the State average/pupil expenditure, that’s fine. Let them spend it on their own—same with all 400+ other school districts.
Say what you like, but if someone chooses to live in the MPS district and get those services, then they can pay for them.
Posted by dad29 on October 30, 2007 at 0631 hrs
Owen, I’m not going to waste my breath trying to convince you what a hard-working state employee I am or that I am too valuable a public servant to cut, but for just a moment, try wrapping your one-track mind around this one:
An additional $10 million cut to the Legislature, on top of the 5% lapse already required in the budget, will almost certainly result in a combination of layoffs, furloughs, and pay cuts. Republican staff morale is already the lowest in recent memory. If you were to implement measures like the ones I listed above I can guarantee you will have staff flip leadership the collective bird next spring when they start getting badgered about going off payroll to run a campaign or giving up weekends and vacation days to lit drop in some God-forsaken rural district for an ungrateful candidate with no reimbursement.
No Capitol staff means no campaign staff, and no campaign staff means another monkey wrench thrown into the machine that Republicans can ill afford. And who would go run those campaigns instead? Dohnal? Dad29? You? You guys think you’re all so valuable to the cause if you sit around and circle jerk each other. Yeah, that will bring Brett Davis, Lee Nerison, John Murtha, Jeff Wood, Terry Moulton, Mary Williams, Doc Hines, Scott Suder, Steve Wieckert, and Karl Van Roy home.
I don’t necessarily expect you to give this comment any weight since after you make up your mind you aren’t willing to consider alternative viewpoints. But this is the bigger picture, for what it’s worth.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on October 30, 2007 at 0833 hrs
Owen, its great you are interested in good policy. But the policy is set by the people who take the risk and get themselves elected. And those that get elected have to govern in a way that they can get re-elected, which is why no current legislator takes your described stances. But I do enjoy your blog.
I hope Wendy doesn’t tell me to get over myself. That may ruin my day.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on October 30, 2007 at 0925 hrs
Anonymus - your comment will get no consideration becuase chickenshit anonymus posts deserve none. You have a name; sign it or shut up.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on October 30, 2007 at 1155 hrs
Yes Joe, we also should’ve disregarded the Federalist Papers because they were written by our founding fathers under a pen name. Did you ever think someone might write anonymously in order to speak the truth while protecting their job? Not everyone has the luxury of sharing their opinion without negative consequence. But it’s still a good thing those perspectives are shared.
What matters is the argument itself - not who is making it. So why don’t you try addressing the individual’s argument?
Posted by Recess Supervisor on October 30, 2007 at 1237 hrs
No one is really anonymous on the Internet…
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on October 30, 2007 at 1248 hrs
Wendy - someone who posts here without a real name, email or web is just as good as anonymous to the other visitors. You as site maintainer may have a few extra bits of info such as IP address or cookie in your logs, but those can change and may not be unique.
RS, although anonymity can protect the whistleblower, it also makes possible the weasel who wants to smash-and-dash.
Although… the infinite number of monkeys theorem might someday cause the B+S bloggers or visitors to generate something as good as the Federalist Papers. Hasn’t happened yet, though, even when feeding them the good bananas. Dohnal’s keyboard seems to be a bit random than many others, so maybe he’s the odds-on bet to be the first to compose Shakespeare.
Posted by John Foust on October 30, 2007 at 1430 hrs
A person should never assume he is “anonymously” doing anything on the internet.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on October 30, 2007 at 1438 hrs
This is an experiment. So what happens if John Foust changes the name, email, location and URL and posts on B+S? Does it look like Wendy to the casual visitor?
Posted by Wendy on October 30, 2007 at 1452 hrs
OK, I’ll make the URL blank. Me again. Ignore test.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on October 30, 2007 at 1453 hrs
Experiment over and done. So does anonymous include pretending to be other people? All discretion lies in the hands of the site owner.
Posted by John Foust on October 30, 2007 at 1454 hrs
And that is all outlined in the terms of service, which you just violated.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on October 30, 2007 at 1514 hrs
John Foust,
Sockpuppetry is a violation of our terms of service. Consider yourself banned.
Please don’t return.
Posted by Jed on October 30, 2007 at 2055 hrs
Wow, it’s either like a bunch of four-year-olds are tattling on each other, or Jim Robinson is offering you consulting advice. What John did was admittedly stupid, and indeed violates the TOS that you have a link to in two-point font at the very bottom of the page. Do you really think people read that stuff? John’s point was simple enough and he made it abundantly clear that he wasn’t the person he was posting as.
If you genuinely think this is sockpuppetry, it’s about the worst sockpuppetry ever. He uses his own identity and tells you he’s doing it.
It’s your show, so by all means do what you want. But to a bystander, it looks like you’re overreacting just a bit. Certainly you wouldn’t have other reasons for wanting to ban Mr. Boots and Kittens, would you?
Posted by Recess Supervisor on October 31, 2007 at 0119 hrs
RS,
It was a final straw thing. John has posted under half a dozen different names and he was not always obvous about it.
Posted by Owen on October 31, 2007 at 0656 hrs
And certainly you would know much more in that regard than I. If he was doing that, well, that’s just silly. Thanks for sharing.
- RS
Posted by Recess Supervisor on October 31, 2007 at 0746 hrs
Well, that’s now two blogs John’s been kicked out of. He got the boot over by me awhile back. He’s moved over to RDW now with his shtick and I am betting he won’t last long over there.
Must be really lonely in his world to crave that much negative attention.
Posted by Peter on November 03, 2007 at 1955 hrs
Who believes that 200$ million will go to health care raise your hands where I can see them…
Posted by vanzari apartament on January 30, 2008 at 1506 hrs
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