Posted on 04/13/2005 10:05:39 AM PDT by truth49
Boo. Hiss. The Legislature is missing an opportunity to pass a piece of meaningful performance-audit legislation. It has approved a watered-down bill instead, all but ensuring a citizens' initiative will tackle the job later this year.
Performance audits are checks on government programs that find if they are getting desired results, are redundant or efficient. Right now, the state auditor's office audits agencies to make sure money is going where it is supposed to be going, but these financial checkups do not assess a program's worth or impact.
Democratic State Auditor Brian Sonntag has done an exemplary job auditing the finances of state agencies, pointing out a plethora of accounting errors and concerns in recent years. Many lawmakers and citizens were hoping his office would be empowered to do even more. The auditor's office and House Speaker Frank Chopp, D-Seattle, rightly drafted a bill that would have done the trick, but it never made it to the House floor.
Instead of giving the auditor's office more latitude, a majority of lawmakers opted to create an unelected citizens committee that will be entrusted with authorizing performance audits. That means the auditor would need to get permission from this committee before pursuing a performance audit. Permission could be denied.
That's an unnecessary and cumbersome step that puts authority in the wrong hands. Further, the Department of Transportation would be off-limits for such audits.
Democrats in charge this session chose to trust and empower an unelected board of citizens instead of the state auditor because of concerns that a future auditor could use his or her office for witch hunts. That's how Sen. Ken Jacobsen, D-Seattle, put it on TVW's "Olympia On Call" last week. But it is hard to see how a good, independent scouring of an agency to find efficient use of taxpayer dollars could ever be defined as a witch hunt. A performance audit can show a program's worth just as easily as it can cast a shadow of doubt. The audits have worked and saved money in many states.
Senate Minority Leader Bill Finkbeiner, R-Kirkland, sponsored an amendment to the inferior legislation now passed that would have given the elected auditor proper authority to pursue performance audits. But a majority of senators rejected it. Finkbeiner told the press that the auditor "should be the one accountable and the one responsible for these audits. It shouldn't be a committee that's put together."
That logic resonates with voters, which is why the Legislature's failure to move in the right direction on this issue surely will give a boost to Tim Eyman's Initiative 900. The initiative would give the state auditor the leeway the Legislature hasn't.
When lawmakers failed to act on lowering unjustified car tab fees, Eyman's Initiative 695 passed overwhelmingly and the state's legislative body was left with egg on its face. Get ready. Lawmakers are going to look foolish once again.
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