LITTLE ROCK — The Republican budget proposal will likely lead to at least 61 workers being laid off and services being cut, including closing a police training academy in Northwest Arkansas, keeping state parks open fewer hours andless money for rural community grants, Gov. Mike Beebe said Tuesday.
His assessment was based on what state agency directors told him after they looked over the proposal that had been made by Rep. John Burris, R-Harrison, who has said Beebe’s budget plan is conservative but could perhaps be tightened further.
Legislative efforts to pass a state budget for fiscal 2013, which starts July 1, have largely stalled as the governor, a Democrat, and Burris, the House Republican leader, have parried over Beebe’s $4.72 billion proposal and Burris’ plan, which calls for spending about $7 million less.
The House delayed taking action Tuesday on a resolution that would allow the House to consider a bill that would spell out a plan for funding the fiscal 2013 budget.
The top House official, Speaker Robert S. Moore Jr., D-Arkansas City, said time is running short to reach a consensus. The legislative session began Feb. 13 with a 45-day limit and is scheduled to end March 2. The Legislature’s Budget Committee, in developing its version, is using the governor’s proposal as a base.
Burris has introduced a resolution to allow his budget plan to be acted on in the House, too.
Moore told reporters discussions are ongoing but saidhe still intends to adjourn March 2.
“In order to do that, procedurally, we need to start this thing moving [today,” Moore said.
Despite the stalemate over the budget, legislative progress is being made at the same time. The governor reported signing 57 appropriation bills into law and the legislative chambers passed about 80 other appropriation bills and sent them to the other chamber for further action.
Senate Republican Whip Michael Lamoureux of Russellville suggested an alternative Republican proposal early Tuesday evening that would put $40 million in state surplus into the Medicaid Trust Fund in light of a $200 million to $250 million shortfall projected by the state Department of Human Services for the fiscal 2014 Medicaid budget.
Burris has said that an impetus for his budget plan proposal was to use less of ongoing collections of general revenue for Medicaid so there would be more money available to pay for the shortfall.
“It’s one that has a lot of merit and deserves more discussion,” he said.
Beebe had asked the agencies’ directors how they would handle the alternative budget’s cuts.
The responses mean he is not willing to consider most of the Republican plan, he said.
Off-limits are Medicaid funding, the Department of Health, the Forestry Commission, the Department of Higher Education and the Economic Development Commission, the governor said.
Beebe said there is no budget area where he is currently comfortable with the proposed cuts.
He said he has asked the state Department of Labor and the state Assessment Coordination Department to provide more details about how they would handle their cuts.
“I told him we’d go back and look at a few of those areas ... that could stand some more explanation, and he was going to go talk to his caucus, and then we were going to visit some more,” Beebe said. “It’s really just a small amount of money. The biggest portion is off the table as far as I am concerned.”
Burris said he still thinks there is room for discussion on those areas.
The governor “offered some good feedback on the ideas that we had, and we tried to do the same. I think the discussion is productive at this point,” he said. “I’m optimistic that there’s always room for consensus.”
Beebe said he isn’t worried about getting a budget approved.
The General Assembly “may not get it the first time or two, but, like I’ve said before, I’ve never seen us leave here without a budget,” Beebe said. “If they do, I don’t think the people would like that.”
State agencies that would be cut 3 percent under Burris’ plan are the Department of Education, the Department of Health, the Department of Human Services, the Department of Arkansas Heritage, the Agriculture Department, the Labor Department, thepositions and the Department of Economic Development would not fill four.
Several other agencies said the cuts would lead to layoffs but did not specify how many.
Other effects include that the Department of Higher Education would halt the creation of the Student Information System and reduce janitorial services, the Department of Parks and Tourism would do less advertising and the Department of Agriculture would not be able to keep all 15 of the rehired Forestry Commission firefighters, though it did not say how many might be laid off again.
Beebe had shifted $550,000 in unused funds from the state Department of Agriculture’s budget so the commission, which is part of the Agriculture Department, could rehire firefighters whose positions had been eliminated in layoffs in January. The Republican caucus proposal would cut $475,556 from the department’s budget.
Beebe called that counterintuitive.
“If you take $475,000 of that away, logic would tell you you turn around and fire 13 of the 15 you just hired,” Beebe said.
Beebe said he also objects to taking $309,354 from the Department of Economic Development.
“That’s our seed corn. Part of the reason we’ve been able to withstand the economic downturn is we’ve been real aggressive trying to attract or create new jobs,” Beebe said.
The department said it would have to implement a 54 percent cut in operational costs for the divisions of business retention, expansion and business development.
The Law Enforcement Standards and Training Commission said its $213,873 cut would mean closing the Northwest Arkansas Police Training Academy in Springdale and stop paying for food and lodging for emergencypersonnel sent to the Law Enforcement Training Academy in East Camden.
Senate Republican leaders have stopped short of endorsing the Burris proposal, which Burris has described as a Republican plan of both the House and the Senate. BeebeDepartment of Higher Education, the Department of Economic Development, the Department of Parks and Tourism, the Department of Environmental Quality and about 50 smaller agencies listed under the single budget heading of miscellaneous agencies. These include the Fair Housing Commission and the Assessment Coordination Department.
The agencies that listed layoffs are Department of Human Services (39), the Crime Laboratory (10), the Department of Emergency Management (8), the Geological Survey (2) and the Law Enforcement Standards and Training Commission (2). The Department of Education also said it would not fill 12told reporters Tuesday that House Republicans aren’t entirely comfortable with the idea, either.
“I don’t see this as a Republican-Democrat thing. The overwhelming majority of the Republicans in the Senate are not going along with this and a significant number of Republicans in the House appear, based on personal conversations with me, not to be in favor of this,” Beebe said.
Lamoureux said he doesn’t believe that the majority of 15 Senate Republicans oppose Burris’ proposed cuts in the governor’s budget plan.
“I think the majority of [Senate] Republicans want to see some type of cut,” he said. “I am still optimisticthat we are going to work out something that the governor can be happy with and everybody can be happy with.”
Senate Budget Committee Chairman Gilbert Baker, R-Conway, said he thinks “everything is still being discussed in the spirit of trying to come up with a good budget.”
FORESTRY SUPPLEMENTAL
In a 34-0 vote, the Senate approved more than six dozen appropriation bills for fiscal year 2013 for agencies ranging from the governor’s office to the Arkansas State University-Beebe as well as two supplemental appropriation bills.
One of the supplementals, Senate Bill 126, will provide $2,666,324 from surplus funds to the Forestry Commission.
Beebe’s request is aimed at helping the commission get through the rest of the fiscal year and repaying federal grant money that the commission improperly used for payroll and other operating expenses. State Forester John Shannon announced his resignation as the commission’s chief executive earlier this month.
The bills go to the House for further action.
DRUG COURT SUPPLEMENTAL
The House voted 95-0 to approve $1.9 million in surplus funds for the Department of Community Correction. The appropriation would be for operating expenses at the department, such as implementing evidence-based practices, reducing caseloads and support for drug courts. It is House Bill 1156. It goes to the Senate for further action.
LIGNITE STUDY
A bill to transfer $2.5 million of the state’s surplus to Southern Arkansas University at Magnolia to help pay for a study of lignite failed to clear the Budget Committee.
The measure is House Bill 1002 by Rep. Garry Smith, DCamden.
Mining the soft, brown coal that lies in the earth of much of southern Arkansas has been touted for decades by some politicians and local officials as a way to improve the economy of the area,
Smith said the bill would help the state obtain $650,000 in federal funds to study the feasibility of converting lignite to crude oil.
“We can attract more companies to come into Arkansas if we’ll venture into this segment of economic development,” he said.
But Rep. Buddy Lovell, DMarked Tree, said the Legislature did not have to pledge taxpayer money to get the Fayetteville Shale started.
“I don’t understand why we would have spend $2.5 million, plus a $650,000 grant, to prove to companies that are in business to make money with coal ... to get them to come here. If they believed that it was profitable, they already would be here,” he said.
ADTEC
Baker said he, Beebe and state Auditor Charlie Daniels support using $1.5 million from the unclaimedproperty fund in the auditor’s office for a work-force training program in the Delta.
The program, theArkansas Delta Training and Education Consortium, known as ADTEC, was created in 2005 by colleges in the Delta to train workers in skills needed by local businesses.
Front Section, Pages 1 on 02/22/2012