Dire Budget Estimate Fit Well With Prevailing Politics
Susan Combs, the state’s comptroller, stumbled two years ago, grossly underestimating Texas’ revenues and forcing lawmakers into a belt-tightening mode that probably wasn’t necessary.
The word “shortfall” haunted the 2011 legislative session, as lawmakers worked to continue programs and services in the face of a recession and an official forecast that income was suffering. They made cuts. They balanced the budget (if you’re charitable and not very good at arithmetic). And they bragged about it and went home.
It would be unfair to leave it at that. A fair number of those lawmakers were happy to make ...
Comments (9)
hans5162@ix.netcom.com hans
Susan Combs has been spectacularly incompetent in every job she's had. The only reason she's been reelected, is because people vote straight ticket and she has an R by her name.
EyesOfTX
Wow. The Trib's bias really shows up in this piece. Somehow, Ross forgets that when the Comptroller came with her estimate at the time she had as many people accusing her of being too optimistic as being too conservative. Was she wrong? Yes, very much so. Were the estimates of her predecessor any better? Not really.
The fact is that we've had a fairly amazing economic recovery in Texas the last few years while the national economy has continued to falter under the idiotic failure of anyone in Washington to lead an effort to stimulate it. This has been mostly thanks to the boom in the oil and natural gas industry, which has turned the Eagle Ford Shale into the world's pre-eminent oil and gas development area. It's been pretty phenomenal watching how the Tribune has studiously ignored that amazing economic story over the last several years. A real failure there.
Jerry Andrews
She was wrong but on message? If the comptroller is on message, then we have a problem. We need true numbers from that office, not based on messages but facts.
BiffTannen
Bascially, they used fear, uncertainty, and doubt to get the super majority they have now? Great.
Josh Sanders
Kudos to Ross for pointing this out, if more media and/or Members were willing to speak up on this issue, perhaps Dewhurst and Perry would not be able to get away with blatantly lying to the public about our state's budget. It is beyond disgraceful that the two most powerful men in state would use this phony $8.8 billion "surplus" to advocate for further tax cuts, when they both know it doesn't exist. When you add the $4.5 billion unpaid Medicaid bill mentioned by Ross to the $2 billion deferal of the August Foundation School Program payment, the $4.6 billion in GR-D account balances that can't legally be used, and the $800 million in tax speedups, this $8.8 billion "surplus" turns into a multi billion dollar deficit. Perry openly denounces the use of these accounting gimmicks and then simulaneously congratulates himself on the imaginery surplus that was solely created by the gimmicks. Unbelievable.
Jim Wier via Texas Tribune on Facebook
So they made cuts to education, not because the money wouldn't be there, but for ideological reasons.
Greg Klie
So did conservatives cut too much, or did they not really make the cuts they bragged about? You can't have it both ways. My concern here would be the misleading of the public into believing they had created a giant surplus that isn't really there. It sounds like the "surplus" won't be enough to cover the budget items that were pushed back. However, the article's main point seems to be that too much spending was cut. I think this is a perfect example of the difference in ideologies. The author doesn't want the focus to be on how there is likely still a deficit in actual dollars, because then that would justify the budget cuts, and perhaps require more. Liberals can't envision a world in which government has money available and doesn't spend it.
As a previous poster noted, the increase in cash has come from the rebound in the state economy, but since the recovery didn't come from government stimulus or investment in "green" energy, you won't read about it here.
We need to hold elected leaders accountable when they play budget games and lie to us, but that isn't the focus of this article. The article is flawed, but hey, at least it's on message.
Jim Baxa
The Tribune bias shows strong here. Claiming an estimate was based upon politics when it is less off than everybody else was guessing!
The legislature needs to cut for real this year, and use that to cut taxes that are far too high.
Alice Taylor
Then I guess Carole Strayhorn was right all along.
Perry and Dewhurst practiced their own brand of Voodoo economics that had nothing to do with real numbers and everything to do with ideology. Coombs was just the lapdog they needed to justify their desire to cut social programs and education and to lower taxes for selected groups of their business friends. They certainly didn't lower my taxes.
Every time I read of Perry or anyone else bleating about lowering taxes in Texas I'm honestly puzzled as to what they are talking about. My taxes as a middle class worker bee are pretty low anyway, especially compared to my income equals in other states. And for all of the bragging about of lowering taxes in the past, my property taxes haven't gone down. I guess I don't make enough money as teacher to notice a single benefit Perry or Dewhurst or anyone else in the Tea Party has given me. I do, however, notice how they've hurt education, children's and women's health and infrastructure by underfunding those programs.