Posted on 04/08/2003 12:20:39 AM PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
Public and higher education consume 56 percent of the proposed state general revenue budget, health and human services make up 25 percent and criminal justice makes up nearly 11 percent.
AUSTIN -- House budget writers Monday approved a pared-back $58.6 billion state budget bill that slashes health and education spending and is expected to spark days of debate when it lands on the House floor next week.
The starting-point budget fell far short of unanimous, bipartisan support within the House Appropriations Committee, with 19 ayes, two nays and eight members absent.
Democrats and Republicans grumbled about the budget-writing process and what turn it will take next as the House continues to wrestle with how to resolve a $9.9 billion revenue shortfall without raising taxes.
Public and higher education consume 56 percent of the proposed state general revenue budget, health and human services make up 25 percent and criminal justice makes up nearly 11 percent.
House Democrats are upset that the bill's cuts affect some of Texas' most vulnerable populations, such as 56,000 elderly people who would no longer be classified as frail. They argue that such services are more critical than those of the Animal Health Commission, the Texas Commission on the Arts and the Historical Commission.
Although it survived, the Historical Commission's budget plunged $37 million from current levels, or more than half.
Several Republicans, however, have complained that health and human services agencies are getting better treatment in the budget than other areas with deeper cuts.
While the health and human services section -- one of the few that received increased funding over current levels -- got a 3.5 percent increase, it won't come close to meeting current needs.
"The need still exceeds the appropriations, the caseload growth that we have had," said Rep. Arlene Wohlgemuth, R-Burleson, chairwoman of the appropriations subcommittee on health and human services. "We are all painfully aware of the increased cost of health care."
The proposed 2004-2005 budget, including a 6 percent increase in federal funds, totals $117.7 billion -- practically even with the current budget.
The general revenue portion of the budget, at $58.6 billion, is $3.4 billion less than the state currently spends.
To write a budget within existing state revenue, the House budget writers started by slicing 12.5 percent out across the board and then restoring money for some of the most sensitive items.
Although the budget is expected to undergo considerable change before final passage, some 10,810 state jobs would be eliminated in its current form.
The budget also would cut 250,000 children from the Children's Health Insurance Program and about 365,000 from health insurance through Medicaid for the poor.
Prenatal care and delivery would no longer be available to 17,000 pregnant women and 366 other women would lose services for breast and cervical cancer.
The budget also assumes closure of one state school for the mentally retarded and one state mental hospital, saving about $30 million.
Meanwhile, it would cut $22 million from a criminal justice program providing medication and treatment for mentally impaired offenders on probation and parole.
Textbook purchases would be sharply curtailed, with a $382 million cut in state funding, and teachers' supplemental health insurance payments would drop from $1,000 a year to $550 a year.
In higher education funding, the budget would cut $4.2 million from the McDonald Observatory's funding and $1.1 million from the Texas Center for Superconductivity at the University of Houston.
The Legislature cut its own budget by 10 percent, or $31 million.
"I voted `no' because I don't think we need to be in this situation," said Appropriations Committee member Rep. Joseph Deshotel, D-Beaumont.
"Some people are going to die if this goes through," he said, singling out the frail elderly. "I think it's irresponsible government. I don't think you just devastate communities."
Deshotel, fellow committee member Rep. Jack Stick, R-Austin, and other lawmakers said they would favor allowing the full House membership the latitude to amend the bill by shifting money from one major section of the budget to another.
The budget is divided into eight major sections, including broad areas such as health and human services, education, general government and criminal justice. So far, the budget cutting has been contained within each section, rather than cutting more from one area to fund another of greater priority.
"I think there needs to be a good deal of debate about this," Wohlgemuth said. "We have not yet talked about moving money from one agency to another."
House Speaker Tom Craddick and Appropriations Committee Chairman Rep. Talmadge Heflin, R-Houston, plan to limit debate on the bill by proposing a rule that lawmakers at large cannot cut from one section of the budget to fund another.
It would be up to House and Senate conferees to decide what to do with any money cut out of the budget by the House or Senate at large, Heflin insisted.
Craddick spokesman Bob Richter said the leaders are concerned that the House might raid health and human services.
"Those kinds of decisions will be made in conference committee," Wohlgemuth said after speaking with Heflin. "As I thought about it, I don't want anybody raiding."
Rep. Richard Raymond, D-Laredo, the other `no' vote in the committee, called the proposed budget a "bad, bad bill" and said he didn't buy the argument that the budget must be protected from House members at large.
"We absolutely haven't done that in the past," he said. "It restricts us. What you're saying to the other members who are not on the committee is, `You don't have a voice.' "
A state experiment with school vouchers might be valuable, if only to demonstrate vouchers' limited utility and great potential for harm. However, in a session in which the Legislature is slashing the state's puny support for public schools, further reductions in the money available to local schools would surpass irresponsibility and approach the border of madness.
The bill approved last week by the House Public Education Committee would betray the committee's stated purpose and court constitutional challenge -- as if Texas needed more school finance litigation. If it became law, the bill would allow low-income students in 11 school districts -- including Houston, Aldine, Pasadena and Alief -- to receive tax dollars to attend private school. The number of vouchers would be limited to 5 percent of students eligible.
In the 2005-2006 school year, any district could participate, and income restrictions would be removed.
Rep. Harold Dutton, D-Houston, voted for the bill, which is co-sponsored by another Houston Democrat, Rep. Ron Wilson. They should know that the Houston Independent School District for several years has arranged for failing students in failing schools to enroll in a private academy at public expense. So far only a handful of children have taken advantage of the offer.
Obviously, vouchers hold little appeal for HISD parents, who by and large want their children to attend good neighborhood schools. But when vouchers are made available to all children, those already attending private school will claim them, greatly diminishing the public schools' resources.
The Katy school board opposes the voucher bills pending in the Legislature and Congress. Katy Superintendent Leonard Merrell made the case against vouchers in a single sentence:
"Why should we use public funds to start new programs when we have trouble funding our existing programs?"
There is no good answer to that question. [End]
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Actually, it sounds like they're letting parents decide where to spend their education dollars.
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