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Leaders defend, assail $29B budget

Read the budget

Friday, Jan. 20, 2006

ANNAPOLIS — Drunken sailors are wearing red this year.

Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr. unveiled a $29.6 billion budget plan Tuesday, boosting state spending by 12 percent for fiscal 2007, the largest increase in decades.

See the full contents of the governor's legislative package at www.governor. maryland.gov.

Ehrlich (R) insisted the spending plan exhibited fiscal restraint, with $670 million set aside to cover forecasted deficits. But Democrats took pot shots, taking revenge from years of being painted as spendthrifts.

‘‘You gotta ask the base of the Republican Party, is this what they expected from Bob Ehrlich?” asked House Speaker Michael E. Busch (D-Dist. 30) of Annapolis. ‘‘If he supports stem cell research, he could get a life membership in the Democratic Party.”

But Ehrlich said the Republican caucuses in the House and Senate are ‘‘universally pleased” with the budget and his plans to cut the state property tax 15 percent.

In an interview Thursday, Ehrlich fired back at Democrats who are painting the governor as a free-spender, driving the state into debt.

‘‘They can’t have it both ways,” he said. ‘‘They can’t call me a right-wing ideologue one day and the next day complain about spending. ... Their central problem from Day One is that they can’t label me.”

Defending the governor

Republicans appeared ready to shield Ehrlich and his budget blueprint, even if a $3.2 billion spending increase was anathema to conservative principles.

One of the few cracks, barely a crow’s foot, came from Senate Minority Leader J. Lowell Stoltzfus.

‘‘There’s a little discomfort in some areas, but it’s relatively minimal. But there’s no question that’s a reality,” said Stoltzfus (R-Dist. 38) of Westover. ‘‘As a fiscal conservative, I have some concerns.”

Stoltzfus and others had a familiar refrain: At least Ehrlich is no Parris Glendening.

Ehrlich ‘‘is spending money we have unlike the previous governor who spent money we didn’t,” House Minority Whip Anthony O’Donnell said.

‘‘This is the first year the governor has had the opportunity to see his priorities funded,” said O’Donnell (R-Dist. 29C) of Lusby. ‘‘For three years, he faced the huge deficits that Parris Glendening left the state of Maryland.”

The prism of the past colored the remarks of Democratic lawmakers as well.

‘‘It’s interesting coming from a governor who for the last three years has been highly critical of the previous administration for having spent money like a drunken sailor,” said Ulysses Currie (D-Dist. 25) of Forestville, who chairs the Senate’s Budget and Taxation Committee.

For Del. Richard S. Madaleno Jr., who sits on the House Appropriations Committee, the budget was less about inebriated seamen and more about Dr. Seuss and the last scenes of ‘‘How the Grinch Stole Christmas.”

‘‘Now he comes sledding into town with all his goodies. We’ll have to see if at the end of the day whether he gets to carve the roast beast,” said Madaleno (D-Dist. 18) of Kensington.

Drilling down

In presenting his budget, Ehrlich noted that he inherited $4 billion in projected deficits and turned that into a $1.7 billion surplus. But the budget document predicts $3.1 billion in deficits for fiscal years 2008 through 2011.

‘‘The challenge for Democrats is Martin O’Malley and Doug Duncan are saying it’s not enough and the legislature is saying it’s too much,” said Sen. David R. Brinkley (R-Dist. 4) of New Market, referring to the Baltimore mayor and Montgomery County executive vying for the Democratic gubernatorial nomination.

Democrats criticized Ehrlich’s spending plan because it far exceeds the spending guideline established by the Spending Affordability Committee. The committee suggested that the portion of state spending funded by a variety of taxes should grow by 8.9 percent. The same portion of the Ehrlich proposal grows by 10.31 percent, or $235.7 million, budget documents said.

Growth at 10.31 percent would be the fastest growth in the 20 or so years that spending affordability has been calculated, with the exception of 1992 when the economy was so brisk, the panel offered no limit.

The $29.6 billion includes revenues from taxes, tuition, fees, the lottery, grants and other sources. The spending includes the full portfolio of government programs, as well as the reserves put aside for the unexpected.

The budget covers the 12 months following July 1, and assumes a 2-cent cut in the state property tax.

Making political hay?

Senate President Thomas V. Mike Miller Jr. already had his knives sharpened at the budget rollout, acerbically calling the governor ‘‘Budget-Busting Bob” for exceeding the spending affordability guideline.

‘‘He wants to spend his way back into popularity with the people of Maryland,” said Miller (D-Dist. 27) of Chesapeake Beach. ‘‘It’s an election-year budget to appease angry voters and buy votes.”

Miller said the legislature would bear the budget-cutting burden, figuring the governor would try to gain political mileage off cuts to his budget.

Jeff Hooke, chairman of Maryland Tax Education Foundation, said Ehrlich was beating the Democrats at their own game of winning votes through state spending.

‘‘The Democrats didn’t complain about it during the Glendening years, and their criticism now is hypocritical,” Hooke said. ‘‘To some degree, the new budget disappoints the Republican base, but I suspect a lot of Ehrlich supporters see it as a one-time election year phenomenon.”

Ehrlich’s budget secretary, Cecilia Januszkiewicz, defended the budget, pointing out that spending affordability is merely a guideline.

She challenged lawmakers to find ‘‘frivolous” spending in the massive document.

In a briefing, Ehrlich ticked off dozens of programs that will benefit from his budget, including raises for state workers, tax breaks for retired military and $281 million for school construction.

‘‘Can you imagine what that number would be if we passed the slots bill?” Ehrlich interjected, one of several jabs at opponents who have balked at legalizing slot machine gambling in Maryland.

Although Ehrlich touted his commitment to education, Prince George’s County Councilman Thomas R. Hendershot (D-Dist. 3) of New Carrollton noted state education aid was mandated by the Thornton Commission package of funding reforms.

But the budget leaves out the geographic cost of education index, or GCEI, an optional part of Thornton that would direct money to school districts with higher costs.

‘‘The real test is what he’s going to do that he doesn’t have to do,” said Hendershot, an adviser to Duncan. ‘‘The Geographic Index would be Ehrlich’s opportunity to do that.”

During Tuesday’s news conference, Ehrlich reflected on his previous budgets, saying he has handed one of the worst budget forecasts any Maryland governor had received.

‘‘We had to manage. We had to do counter-cultural things in the context of the state budget,” he said. He refused to increase sales and income taxes, ‘‘and we were not going to follow the status-quo Annapolis formula.”

Busch faulted Ehrlich for not inviting legislative leaders to discuss the budget.

‘‘They are not first on my call list to get budget advice,” Ehrlich said in the interview. He blasted the Democrats for passing Thornton without a long-term funding source and contributing to the inherited debt he faced coming into office.

But Busch said spending at this level will put the state into the same position it was four years ago, when an economic downturn followed a jump in state spending.

‘‘There’s no rhyme or reason to the spending and the cuts of Bob Ehrlich. ... You’d think a guy who presents himself as a fiscal conservative would come up with a tax cut to appeal to his base. What’s he’s doing is engaging in big government,” Busch said.

Staff Writers Thomas Dennison and Tiesha Higgins contributed to this report.