A legislative panel Thursday reversed its decision to call for cutting spending on employee salaries and benefits for staff members of former Lt. Gov. Mark Darr.
The decision came shortly before the Senate unanimously passed legislation that would allow Gov. Mike Beebe to leave the lieutenant governor’s post vacant until January.
At the request of Senate President Pro Tempore Michael Lamoureux, R-Russell-ville, the Joint Budget Committee’s Special Language Subcommittee expunged its Wednesday vote to limit spending on the office’s employee salaries to $40,000 and spending on their benefits to $12,000 during the final six months of this year.
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Mark Darr
On Wednesday, Sen. Bruce Maloch, D-Magnolia, proposed the spending limits in an amendment to an appropriations bill for the lieutenant governor’s office.
The lieutenant governor’s office four employees are paid a total of more than $200,000 a year. Darr resigned Feb. 1 after being fined $11,000 for 11 violations of state ethics laws and regulations. Beebe, the entire congressional delegation and numerous other officials had urged Darr to quit, and his opponents were preparing impeachment proceedings if he did not.
The Senate’s leader has said he’s the employees’ supervisor while the post remains vacant. Democratic Attorney General Dustin McDaniel has disagreed, saying Lamoureux is misinterpreting the law and doesn’t have the authority to oversee Darr’s former staff.
Lamoureux told the subcommittee Thursday that he was unable to attend its meeting Wednesday and that he wanted a chance to discuss Maloch’s amendment to the lieutenant governor’s office appropriations bill, Senate Bill 53.
He later left the meeting without talking about Maloch’s amendment.
Also Thursday, the Senate unanimously approved Senate Bill 139 by Eddie Joe Williams, R-Cabot, to allow the governor to forgo calling a special election to fill the lieutenant governor’s position this year. A lieutenant governor will be elected in the Nov. 4 general election and sworn into office in January.
Employees in the lieutenant governor’s office and their annual salaries are Chief of Staff Bruce Campbell, $75,132; Communications Director Amber Pool, $57,564; Director of Governmental Relations Josh Curtis, $51,564; and Executive Assistant Raeanne Gardner, $33,660.
Campbell is a former employee for the state Senate and former director of the state Department of Rural Services under Republican Gov. Mike Huckabee.
Lamoureux said in an interview that he was surprised that Maloch’s amendment cleared the subcommittee Wednesday.
He said he prefers “the status quo,” and denied telling the employees before Darr’s resignation that they didn’t have to worry about losing their jobs.
“It is not a good situation,” Lamoureux said. “I just don’t think we ought to have half budgets, and partial this and partial that. I think we ought to just ride it out and elect a new person and let the office operate the way it’s supposed to operate. But I understand what Sen. Maloch is trying to do as well.”
He said the office’s employees are looking for other jobs, and it’s likely they’ll find them before the end of the year.
“I don’t have the authority to fire four people [in the office],” Lamoureux said.
Legislators effectively have that authority through the power of purse. The legislation that Lamoureux derailed would have eliminated most of the employees, effective July 1.
Pool, the communications director, declined Thursday to respond to a request from the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette for a description of the work the employees will be doing between July 1 and Dec. 31.
Lamoureux said the office’s employees are going to be answering phones and replying to emails.
He said he’ll be acting governor starting today because Beebe is going to Washington, D.C., for a few days, and the office’s employees “help me with that.”
Maloch said he voted against Lamoureux’s request to expunge the subcommittee’s vote on the budget cuts.
“It is whatever the will of the membership is and I have to get it through this [subcommittee],and it appears that I don’t have the votes to do that,” he said. “I think the amendment that was put on [Wednesday] was the right thing to do. I think it made sense, and I was good with leaving the one staff person there, but the majority rules.”
Joint Budget Committee Co-Chairman Sen. Larry Teague, D-Nashville, said Maloch’s proposal to cut spending on the employees “will be dead” because “this is of low importance to a lot of members” in the fiscal session, which started Feb. 10.
“I thought there ought to be somebody in there to answer the phone. I don’t know how many it takes,” he said.
Front Section, Pages 1 on 02/21/2014