Thursday at 7 p.m. TVW’s Inside Olympia will look back at the last time the budget was this bad.

Host Austin Jenkins will talk with then-Gov. John Spellman as well as Republican House Speaker Bill Polk and House Minority (Democratic) Leader Wayne Ehlers. It ought to be a very interesting conversation.

Background: In Nov. 1979, Washington voters approved a Constitutional amendment to require the Legislature to meet annually. (Before then, it was a once-per-two-years affair.) According to the official legislative history, the following session, in Jan. 1980, was virtually a non-event.

In Nov. 1980, Republicans took control of the House, Democrats had a 25-24 lead in the Senate and Gov. Dixy Lee Ray was defeated.

And then: The state suddenly faced a budget shortfall of $1 billion.

If session this year has been stressful for you, reading this could give you heartburn (speaking from experience): In the middle of budget negotiations, a scale-tipping Senate Democrat switched parties, (more…)

Tags: Budget, Democrats, Inside Olympia, Republicans, taxes

Yesterday, Microsoft announced its first major layoffs in the software company’s history. KUOW reported the hit to the economy is even greater than it sounds: Each Microsoft job supports, on average, three other local jobs.

But something CEO Steve Ballmer said relates to state government budget discussions: Microsoft, he said, is making cuts because they don’t see the economic downturn as a recession, they think the economy is resetting to a lower level of consumer spending.

It’s not just semantics: The difference is at the heart of the public budget-related disagreements between Republicans and Democrats here.

Republicans say state spending grew to an unsustainable level and should be reset to a lower level.

Democrats say we’re in a recession, the state’s economy will bounce back, and with that will come increased revenues from sales and property tax.

And that’s why Democrats have been open to using federal stimulus money to patch the $6 billion-and-growing budget hole, whereas Republicans say they don’t: One group thinks they’re building a bridge, the other thinks they’re lengthening the plank.

Tags: Budget, Democrats, economy, Republicans

I just got back from a press conference with Senate Majority Leader Lisa Brown and a half dozen other Democrats in the Senate. They were announcing a package of bills aimed at creating jobs across the state in high-demand areas, like healthcare and “green” jobs.

How do they plan to do it, particularly in a tough budget year? Many of the measures focus on using programs that already exist in a different way. For example: There is currently a program that helps low-income households pay their utility bills. One of the proposals would free up that money for home energy audits, which would help identify and correct energy inefficient areas throughout the home. The idea is that jobs and a long-term drop in utility payments are achieved simultaneously.

Another example, courtesy of Sen. Karen Keiser: There are currently 12,000 vacancies in healthcare-related jobs across the state. By partnering with community colleges, she said, and using some of the $4 billion of state unemployment insurance money for workforce training (Note: $4 billion, not $400 million, which was the figure cited at the press conference), more workers could be trained for those jobs — either current healthcare workers moving up the chain (LPN to RN, for example) or new workers moving into the field.

They estimated the efforts could produce 24,000 jobs, though there wasn’t an estimate on what time frame it would take to get there.

Tags: Democrats, Jobs, Senate

The 2009 Washington state Legislature starts on Monday. In the 105 days that follow, state lawmakers will need to put together a budget that addresses a projected $5.7 billion deficit.

Here’s Inside Olympia host Austin Jenkins talking to Senate Majority Leader Lisa Brown and House Minority Leader Richard DeBolt:

And here’s the City Club of Tacoma’s annual legislative preview, which was earlier this week:

Now go get some rest and get ready for Monday.

Tags: Democrats, House, Legislature, Lisa Brown, Republicans, Richard DeBolt, Senate, Washington

Yesterday, lawmakers gathered in Olympia with dozens of reporters and editors from around the state for the annual Associated Press legislative forum. Their message: The budget will dominate this 105-day session.

Another message: This session will end in 105 days. To paraphrase Marty Brown, Gov. Chris Gregoire’s Legislative director: Budget decisions won’t get easier with more time. There’s no way to predict whether Legislators will be able to agree on a budget by the end of regular session, but several said it was an important goal.

Watch the entire forum here:

On the budget:
(more…)

Tags: Budget, Democrats, Governor, House, Public Policy, Republicans, Senate, Ways & Means