N.C. lawmaker: Expect $1B in cuts in Perdue budget (Associated Press)
Monday, April 19, 2010 (Updated 10:57 pm)
By Gary D. Robertson
RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) — Gov. Beverly Perdue’s spending proposal for next year likely will contain aggressive efforts to improve North Carolina’s public education and mental health systems as well as spending cuts of around $1 billion to help pay for them, legislative budget-writers said Monday.
Perdue, who is scheduled Tuesday to propose adjustments to the $19.6 billion budget already approved last summer and set to begin July 1, also wants changes to the personal care services program that has struggled with Medicaid overspending, according to a lawmaker who got a preview last week from Perdue and her staff.
“She’s got an ambitious program,” said Rep. Mickey Michaux, D-Durham, senior co-chairman of the House Appropriations Committee. “We’ve got to see how ambition works out.”
Michaux and a Senate budget-writer interviewed Monday declined to discuss specifics about the health or education initiatives. The Democratic governor hasn’t provided many hints publicly about what she wants lawmakers to approve during this year’s session save for a $17 million small business assistance package and ethics reforms.
But Perdue has said her spending plan would include efforts to expand her “Ready Set Go!” program designed to ensure every child must graduate from high school with the skills to succeed in a career or attend a community college, university or technical training.
Perdue spokeswoman Chrissy Pearson confirmed last week the budget proposal would have money to pay for hand-held devices teachers can use to make real-time diagnostic assessments of students to ensure they don’t fall behind their classmates. Each device costs about $300, Pearson said. Perdue said in January she would shift money away from outdated or unnecessary state programs to find additional cash.
“The bulk of the budget will be about trimming state government (and) finding ways to make state government leaner,” Pearson said Monday.
Perdue also said in March she wanted to repay North Carolina state workers their lost wages for taking away 0.5 percent of their salaries last year to close a budget shortfall, at a cost of $65 million.
Pearson declined to comment late Monday on whether Perdue would propose any pay raises for state employees or teachers, or whether new taxes or fees would be in the budget.
Rep. Pryor Gibson, D-Anson, co-chairman of the House Finance Committee, said he foresaw no major tax increases in part because he’s not aware of Perdue floating the idea with lawmakers: “I wouldn’t expect her budget to have any surprises in the tax department.”
The state Medicaid office has struggled to reduce personal care services spending by $40 million as required in this year’s budget. Next year’s budget is slated to boost those savings by another $20 million.
Michaux said Perdue’s adjusted second-year budget would cut about $1 billion — a reflection of another round of fiscal challenges faced by the governor and fellow Democrats who control the House and Senate.
The fiscal numbers aren’t as bad as last year, when Democrats said they closed a budget gap of $4.6 billion with spending cuts, federal stimulus money and $1 billion in new taxes.
Perdue’s budget office and the legislative fiscal office agree for now the state will receive $788 million less than expected for the new year’s budget. Lawmakers say that means they may have to find up to $1.2 billion in spending cuts, additional revenues or both when they reconvene May 12.
With lawmakers considering an additional 5 percent in cuts and Perdue’s administration budget reductions of up to 7 percent, there’s little fat remaining in state government, said Sen. A.B. Swindell, D-Nash, one of the chief Senate budget-writers.
Spending cuts last year caused several hundred state employees to lose their jobs and more than 5,000 teacher and educator positions in local school districts to be eliminated, according to state data. State education boosters predicted the public school job eliminations could increase to 7,000 if lawmakers don’t prevent local education cuts from increasing by $80 million to $305 million.
“We are headed in the wrong direction when it comes to public schools in North Carolina,” Sheri Strickland, president of the North Carolina Association of Educators, said at a news conference last week urging lawmakers to improve school funding.
