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Friday, January 23, 2009
Questioning pork is vital in lean times
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Painful though these budget times are for legislators who, whether Democrat or Republican, much prefer to be showering the bounties of your labors on those they deem more worthy, there is much to be said for occasional hardship.
It prompts the serious to ask the questions that are brushed aside when Georgians are working, times are good and the public till is filled to excess.
At budget hearings under the Gold Dome this week, Jay Neal (R-LaFayette), a representative from the northwest corner of the state, one of the last true bastions of fiscal conservatism, asked a question of Department of Transportation Commissioner Gena L. Evans.
The commissioner had just finished a plea for more money and for a “new source of money” that is, most likely, a statewide 1 percent sales tax.
Speaking as a taxpayer looking at government from afar, Neal noted the message sent: “We understand times are tough and we have not done a good job” of solving transportation problems, but instead of adjusting, “we provide you less service and charge you more taxes.” That, he said, “is a tough sell.”
“We have shut down everything we can shut down,” replied Evans, citing travel, equipment and vehicle purchases, maintenance, and vacant and unfilled-position eliminations.
Earlier, Department of Juvenile Justice Commissioner Albert Murray was defending his bailiwick, noting that among the spending reductions is a wilderness program in Early County for troubled young males. As structured, its effectiveness is marginal, Murray said. To which, he got two questions from committee members. One questioned the decision because of its impact on a county he represented. The other wanted to know whether girls had a wilderness camp program, too.
State Rep. Ed Rynders (R-Albany) suggested that it’d be a good time to examine all programs and measure them as to their effectiveness. “In these tough budgetary times, now is the time we ought to look at every program, and if we are going to eliminate them, we should look at the data and determine their effectiveness.”
The purpose here is to make the point that spenders need the discipline of hard times, or of caps that limit the growth of government. Hard times permit, too, real insight into how bureaucrats and politicians govern when money’s free-flowing.
An example from Gov. Sonny Perdue and the DOT is a boondoggle rail project from Atlanta to Lovejoy that exists only because $83 million in federal money was earmarked. This proposed commuter rail line is a pork-barrel project kept alive because the money was earmarked and is therefore not available for actual congestion relief. It’s another reason, incidentally, to fear the proposed $825 billion “economic stimulus” program that’s about to dump money willy-nilly.
Perdue, prudently, did not divert $15.1 million in state money to the White Elephant — prompting U.S. Rep. David Scott (D-Atlanta) to go bonkers. “We have $119 million sitting there in the bank,” he said, urging reconsideration. “Communities around this nation would give their right arm to have that money.”
Evans said the department is “looking for” $83 million for commuter rail, implicitly inviting legislators to pony up.
We come now to the proposed 1 percent statewide sales tax, which would generate $74 billion over 20 years.
The burning question is: What do we buy, what actual, measurable congestion relief, do we get for $74 billion? An actual list of proposed purchases will come within weeks, she said. In total, though, the need is $250 billion, Evans said.
Hard times and short money should — combined with a plea for an additional $74 billion planned spending — produce a no-boondoggle project list that should stand up to honest cost-benefit analysis. But yet, commuter rail does survive, prompting the concern that every interest group’s wish list is the driving force behind the request for a new tax statewide.
Times are tough. People are out of work. Don’t take their money and buy them toys, and don’t take it to spend on programs that are marginally useful.
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