Back to my own little plot of ground. The members of the Louisiana House of Representatives Committee on Appropriations voted to cut the budget submitted by Governor Bobby Jindal.
From the Advocate:
Lawmakers slashed Gov. Bobby Jindal’s $30 billion state government spending plan by $120 million Sunday.
Most of the cuts in House Bill 1 — the budget legislation for the state spending year that begins July 1 — were to the Medicaid program and public colleges and universities.
For example, lawmakers trimmed $52 million in payments to private doctors and others who treat the poor.
Of course, the poor with no voice and little power for advocacy come first in the cuts. And public education in Louisiana has such a sterling reputation for excellence, that we can surely afford to cut allocations to the universities.
Legislators recommended the cuts in answer to a push by so-called fiscal conservatives to rein in the growth of state government.
....
Another $2.5 million was whittled away from a pre-kindergarten program for 4-year-old students.
Sigh....
These cuts come in the face of a large budget surplus from royalties from the increase in the price of oil. I'm having a hard time finding an exact figure for the size of the surplus, but one estimate was $800 million. Now, the citizens of Louisiana deserve some of that money back in in the form of tax cuts, but in the cause of fiscal conservatism, it's not right to target health care for the poor and education to take the first hits - or so it seems to me.
UPDATE: Meanwhile there's a bill in the Senate to triple the salaries of the legislators.
I agree with you, Mimi. But I also want to spank the Advocate. $120 million is 4/10ths of 1 percent (.0004) of $300 billion.
ReplyDelete"slashing" is not the first word I would think of to describe a cut of less than 1/2 of one percent. But it does make it worse: why couldn't those lawmakers find their 120 million from somewhere else in the remaining 99.6 percent of the budget? Like maybe their own salaries, for a start.
But I guess that would require them to be something other than politicians.
Pre-K, Medicaid beneficiaries, public sector students? Interesting how these servants of the public purse don't pick on people who can fight back. Very, very disheartening.
ReplyDeleteCut their pay? Indeed not! There's a bill in the Senate to triple their salaries.
ReplyDeleteThe salary bill is obscene, and I believe they're going to pass it. They will put their salaries at 33% of a congressional salary, thus any time the feds get a raise, our leges will also - without having to vote on it.
ReplyDeleteThe salary bill kills me. We're going to pay them three times as much to go to Baton Rouge and make mischief.
ReplyDeleteSouth Carolina, bless it - that most backward of Southern states in terms of social conscience where the poor and indigent are concerned - has just increased its cigarette tax, about the lowest in the Nation, by 50 cents a pack and has earmarked the whole of that sum to providing medical assistance for the uninsured and to help the working poor purchase insurance. Shady insurance providers may get some of it, but the call to use the money to provide "tax relief" for middle and upper income folks failed utterly. Nice to feel good about one's state for a change.
ReplyDeleteThe Lord bless the political leaders in South Carolina. The Lord give wisdom to the the political leaders in Louisiana.
ReplyDeleteGrandmère, Maybe the good people of Louisiana can cut the salaries of the politicians in Louisiana down to zero by just voting the lot of them out of office in the next election cycle. If they step on the poor enough, the poor will eventually rise up. ("Let not the hope of the poor be taken away.")
ReplyDeleteTRIPLE the salaries! (triple sigh) argggggg. whatever happened to public SERVANTS.
ReplyDeleteBecause the term limits law took effect for the last election, there are quite a few newbies in the legislature, but they quickly learn to act like the same-old, same-old lawmakers.
ReplyDeleteIndeed! What ever happened to public servants?