Posted by AzBlueMeanie:
"It's like déjà vu, all over again." -- Yogi Berra.
It's official. One month after the GOP-controlled Legislature and our Accidental Governor failed to produce a balanced budget before the constitutionally mandated July 1 deadline for the first time in Arizona history, and four weeks into a Special Session, Republicans have once again failed to produce a balanced state budget. Arizona Capitol Times » No budget this week; session will drag into Aug. (subscription required):
The Senate met for a few minutes today (July 31), but only to adjourn the special session until Aug. 4. Even then, though, it’s not clear whether leaders in the Senate will be able to gather enough votes to pass the budget legislation that has tied them up for the past several days.
Republicans are once again proving that "government doesn't work" -- when incompetent ideological Republicans run the government. Hmmm, maybe next time voters shouldn't elect these incompetent ideological Republicans. Kick em' all out!
The statutory deadline to submit ballot propositions for a special election on November 3 was today (Friday). The game clock has expired. As I predicted, the "no new tax" pledge Republicans ran out the clock on the Accidental Governor.
Elections departments generally require two weeks after the November general election to complete their work on the general election. Thanksgiving is November 26.
Only states like Louisiana schedule elections (run-off elections) during the holiday season in December. Christmas caroling while campaigning may be a way of life in Louisiana, but not here in Arizona (the 1990 gubernatorial election resulted in a run-off election held in January 1991. Arizona later changed the law to do away with run-off elections after the experience). This puts us into January, simply too late for any sales tax increase approved by voters -- a big assumption -- to go into effect and to produce the tax revenue necessary to balance the FY 2010 budget.
The cost of a special election just went up as well, since it cannot be piggy-backed onto the November general election.
The Legislature needs a whole new budget plan -- one that can garner the two-thirds vote necessary to enact a budget that does not have to be referred to the voters in a special election. This will require a bipartisan budget, a skill for which Republicans appear ideologically incapable. Arizona budget-balancing plan hits a snag:
Republican leaders still did not seem interested in reaching out to Democrats Friday.
“We can’t afford them,” said Senate Appropriations Chairman Russell Pearce, R-Mesa.
House Majority Whip Andy Tobin, R-Paulden, said that Republicans and Democrats are so far apart in their views on whether to reduce the size of state government that a compromise might be impossible.
“When some movement happens on one side, others fall off,” Tobin said in describing previous negotiations with Democrats.
The Legislature should stop wasting time, effort and money on punting this decision to voters in a special election. Just do the job for which they were elected and get this budget done.
UPDATE: Secretary of State Ken Bennett says he can extend the referral deadline to Wednesday of next week. How budget saga will end is anyone's guess But two of the expected "yes" votes for the budget will be on vacation next week: Sen. Jim Waring, R-Phoenix, and Majority Leader Chuck Gray, R-Mesa. The extended deadline is likely to be missed as well.
