Detailing state budget review
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The Confederated Salish and Kootenai water compact passed out of the Senate Judiciary Committee last Friday. SB 262 will be heard on the Senate floor Tuesday, with the final Senate reading on Wednesday. Then that bill will go to the House along with all the other bills that have passed the senate.
The coming weekend is our four-day transmittal break. It sure will be good to get home.
Working on the budget is still my favorite thing to do around here. I worked on the General Government Section of HB 2, the state budget bill. We reviewed the new proposals for many departments: Administration, Revenue, Commerce, Labor and Industry, Military Affairs, Governor’s Office, Legislative Branch and the Commissioner of Political Practices.
You may remember how this works. The governor presents the increases he wishes in all the agencies I listed above. We approve or disapprove these requests. Yes, we can dig deeper and ask for specific base spending, and we often do so.
We made our analysis more difficult this session because we started with the legislative appropriated 2015 spending rather than what was actually spent, although we did approve longevity pay increases, inflation and the healthcare increases.
The sub-committees get through the budget in about 40 days. Then the full House looks at each section. They can add or subtract in amendments. When the House passes HB 2, the Senate has the same chance to amend. At the very end, each house approves or disapproves these amendments.
The largest increase will be in Section B, Health and Human Services, even before Medicaid expansion. I doubt we can hold their increases to 7 percent in each of the next two years.
My sub-committee did make a couple major changes. Cut the Governor’s airplane. The plane costs $1,650 an hour to fly, and that amount includes the one-and-a-half pilots. The full time pilot earns $98,666 per year and the part-time earns $37,274.
Our review showed that of the 149 flights last year, 62 flights carrying the governor were less than one hour long. With warm up time, it is nearly as fast and much less expensive to drive to Butte, Great Falls or Missoula from Helena. Add 10 short maintenance flights and nearly half of the flights were under one hour.
The rest of the airplane use was 16 percent for other government personnel, 4 percent that could have been commercial (Seattle, Salt Lake) and 32 percent were flights between one and three hours, the largest number to Billings.
Yes, we have a big state. But it would save money to rent a plane whenever it was needed. This has been called partisan, but I watch every tax dollar regardless of who is the spender.
Speaking about being partisan, it is my experience that the Democrats on the sub-committee vote to approve every increase proposed by the governor. I do believe that we need to support our party, but their loyalty is unvarying. I remember republicans in budget disagreements with Governor Racicot and Governor Martz.
Your state government rents a lot of space, especially in Helena. We are not happy with some of the rent increases. The Department of Revenue pays for downtown Helena parking for their employees. The last number I saw was $64,000 per year.
Did you know that there are form emails and postcards just like form letters? I received hundreds of emails about an Article V Constitutional Convention of States before I figured out how to block them — many are from out of state. I still read every local comment and I will still try to answer as many as I can.
If you are free on Friday evening, join Representatives Hertz and Salomon and myself at the North Lake County Library in Polson. And keep emailing me at sen.janna.taylor@mt.gov or leave me a message at (406) 444-4800. My cell is (406) 253-8766, but it’s usually off. Remember I work for you.
