After a historic turn of events Friday night in the Senate, two budgets have now been adopted: A House Democrat budget (supported only by Democrats with three Democrats voting no) and a Senate Republican budget (supported by all GOP Senators and three Democrat Senators). Here is how the Seattle Times describes the events: “The passage of a Republican budget out

While not on the order of the love note Washington State Democrats delivered Monday to liberal activists, Republicans in Olympia today are taking credit for a gift of deceptive importance to the objective of righting the state’s fiscal ship. House Bill 2607—a proposal spearheaded by House Republicans that would require the Office of Financial Management to publish a six-year budget

It’s been 107 days since the Governor called last December’s special session declaring “timely legislative action is needed to secure the State’s fiscal health and address the shortfall in the 2011-2013 operating budget.” We are now in day 33 of the 60 day 2012 REGULAR Session without a budget plan being introduced let alone debated. Defending the lack of action

The House and Senate Ways and Means Committee have advanced two bills to help policy makers focus on the long-term impact of budget decisions. The House Ways and Means Committee advanced HB 2607: Requiring a six-year budget outlook tied to existing revenues. The Committee adopted an amendment reflecting the recommendation from my testimony that the budget outlook should be updated

Yesterday marked the beginning of the 2012 Legislative Session. Greeting lawmakers was a presentation by the Office of Financial Management on the state’s 6-yr budget outlook. Bottom line – we’ve some serious structural problems. Here is a presentation by Stan Marshburn (Deputy Director of OFM) discussing the projections that show multi-billion dollar deficits going forward. Among the major contributors to

On January 9, the Washington State Legislature will come back to session. On their busy agenda is rectifying the horrendous $2 billion budget deficit that they delayed reforming in the last legislative session. While our budget crisis may seem like the fault of an ineffective legislature, the fault lies in the hands of Governor Gregoire. To understand why Gov. Gregoire

With the Legislature consistently showing itself willing to wait to the last moment to bring the state’s budget into balance, Washington Policy Center has proposed changing the Governor’s current across-the-board authority to respond to a deficit to discretionary authority to make surgical reductions to enact timely savings. One potential way this new discretionary budget cutting authority could be structured could

Our legislators in Olympia are facing two deficits in the special session to deal with the gap in the 2011-2013 state budget: the first is a $2 billion shortfall, and the second is a lack of courage to address it. Already, Senate Majority Leader Lisa Brown has indicated the Legislature will spend next week piecing together a down payment of

If you see your lawmakers monitoring news in Europe, chances are it’s not for vacation planning but instead state budget planning. According to the state’s economist Dr. Arun Raha, economic turmoil in Europe could play a huge role in our state budget debate. From today’s state revenue forecast: “The main threats to Washington’s economy today lie well outside our region.

It’s hard to tell from reading the articles, but state employee compensation has risen 17.3 percent over the last ten years. Both the Olympian and the News Tribune recently ran the same story about state employee salaries and compensation. According to the stories, salary and benefits have decreased as a share of general-fund spending over the course of the last

Is Washington’s pension system well-funded and secure, or does the accounting system it uses simply overstate strengths while minimizing weaknesses? According to the state’s actuary, the truth is a combination of both. Matt Smith, appearing on Thursday night in a town hall meeting at the University of Washington, told attendees the state uses a variety of methods to look at

On the news that Gov. Christine Gregoire is finally calling the State Legislature back into session to tackle budget woes in the form of a $1.5 billion deficit, Republican candidate for governor Rob McKenna issued a statement, praising the incumbent Governor for taking action and suggesting that a quick and bipartisan process is what Washington needs: “No one can be

Governor Gregoire announced this morning she is calling a special session to start November 28 to address the state’s $1 billion plus budget deficit. Here are my notes from her press conference: Need budget to be done in one special session – she won’t call another. The total budget reductions needed are in the range of $2 billion to provide

PubliCola has put out a piece Thursday, “The End of Sustainability,” the gist of which is that cutting Washington state’s budget is not the answer. “When you are in a recession, the only way to sustain the budget is to bring in new revenue,” the author writes.  “Luckily, the way economics work, when the government can spend more, it eases

After news of the revenue forecast’s $1.4 billion drop in revenue for the 2011-13 budget and the now $1.3 billion budget hole confronting the state—assuming use of every last red cent of reserves—Gov. Christine Gregoire promptly issued a press release where she stated that waiting until the regular legislative session in January to address the problem is not an option:

The Chair and ranking member of the State Senate Ways and Means Committee were interviewed by TVW’s Austin Jenkins last Thursday on what the options are for lawmakers to address the estimated $1 billion plus budget deficit. Among the questions Jenkins asked Sen. Ed Murray (D) and Sen. Joe Zarelli (R) were their thoughts on our proposal to provide the

It may have been by design, though perhaps it was simply fortuitous, that the Economic and Revenue Forecast Council voted to extend the contract for the state’s current Chief Economist Arun Raha another year before they heard what he had to say today. The embattled chief economist delivered a quarterly revenue projection that was unambiguously depressing. According to the forecast,

Believe it or not, state revenues are still projected to increase by $2.1 billion for the 2011-13 biennium over the 2009-11 biennium. Unfortunately for lawmakers this increase is $1.4 billion less than what was estimated at the June Revenue Forecast meaning a budget deficit exceeding $1 billion now exists. According to the state’s chief economist, Dr. Arun Raha: “We are