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Monday: Total Impasse
posted at 2009-07-28 00:49 | Last modified 2009-07-28 12:21
Okay, sure, budget season’s always nuts by definition. Deals bubble up and then pop, deadlines stretch like magic, numbers rearrange themselves, and everyone’s got one eye on the door.
But this year is crazier than normal, no question. We’re on the cusp of August, and the two sides seem just as far apart as they were 6 weeks ago, maybe farther – thanks in no small part to a newbie governor who opted to wait till the bottom of the ninth to show off her curveball.
Perdue’s de facto veto threat last week didn’t just gum up what looked like a plausible budget deal – it provided the Senate with the rationale it needed to abandon a slate of politically unpalatable tax increases and return to its earlier goal of “tax reform.” Senate Finance co-chair Dan Clodfelter says they're going back to their mantra: “Broaden the base, lower the rate.”
"What we’ve said consistently is in the current climate, if you’re going to fix the tax system, you have to do more than just raise a few rates on a temporary basis. You’ve gotta go in and redesign the taxes so you’ve got stable revenue going forward."
Clodfelter says he’s confident the Senate plan can raise a billion in new revenue, but he couldn’t offer even an estimated timeframe for the plan’s completion.
“We’ve got to get this right. The last time we were in a financial fix like this was the Great Depression. This state took the time to get it done right.”
As you’d suspect, none of that played well on the House side. Speaker Hackney was incredulous.
“On July 27th, they’re doing this?”
Hackney says his caucus is convinced they can salvage enough of the original deal to get a budget passed for this year, and come back to tax reform next year. They’re planning to offer the Senate a revised proposal tomorrow. He says the House will do its best to be flexible, but it might not matter.
“They’ve told us they don’t want to negotiate right now. So we’ll send ‘em a plan and hope that changes. “
Back on the Senate side, Clodfelter says that’s not exactly true.
“No, we’re always interested in negotiating. But I think the House has got to get serious about some of the proposals – reform proposals – we’ve put on the table.”
Leadership squabbles aside, the rank and file may be getting restless. The hot rumor of the day was that some lawmakers were pushing to go home Fri, recess for August, and come back in September after the big chairs get their deal worked out. Hackney said the proposal’s been discussed, but House members “aren’t there yet” – he says they’d rather stay in town and push to get the job done.
Clodfelter says he can’t speak for the rest of the Senate, but he has no plans to go home. And, he says, it’s not the Senate’s place to apologize for the delay.
“We’ve been waiting for the House folks to sort of pick up the challenge with us. If it’s late, it’s because we’ve been waiting on them.”
Feel the love? Get comfortable. It could be a very long fall.
Touch not the cat
State lawmakers have sent the governor a proposal to protect the pets of victims of domestic abuse. Under S1062, a protective order granted to a domestic violence victim would also extend to household pets.
Critics say it’s political correctness run amok. Onslow Republican George Cleveland says the courts can’t even keep kids safe, let alone pets: “A pet is an animal. We eat animals.” And Robeson Dem Ronnie Sutton dismissed the bill as proof “we’ve been here too long.”
But supporters argue it’s meant to help people more than pets. Wake Dem Grier Martin says some abuse victims won’t leave dangerous situations out of fear for a pet’s safety. Pets are sometimes threatened or held hostage to pressure the victim to stay. And Surry Republican Sarah Stevens says some cases are even worse:
"Frequently, as an act of terrorism, people will torture the pet or the animal to show the spouse what they can do to them."
[Shudder.]
The bill puts pets under the same protection as their owners. It passed both House and Senate by wide margins, and is headed to the desk of Governor Bev Perdue.
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