Waiting for legislative courage

By Jon Ralston

Friday, April 3, 2009 | 2 a.m.

News item: A legislative budget subcommittee entombs the administration’s plan to merge the economic development and tourism commissions and theoretically save the state $400,000.

— 3/30/09

Here are the questions raised by the bipartisan shellacking The Man Formerly Known as Governor took in that legislative budget panel this week:

A. If lawmakers can’t agree on a proposal over what many suffering Nevadans will see as a nonessential set of services, an idea that would save a relatively small but symbolic amount of money, how will they agree on any substantial cuts?

B. If Republicans and Democrats are going to band together, as they did here, to paint the administration’s cuts as penny-wise and pound-foolish, what hope is there for the administration’s budget to be anything but decimated?

C. If this is a prologue to what the next few weeks hold, and with much larger and more substantial cuts to reconcile, what are the chances that the Gang of 63 can hold the amount of revenue they want to raise to less than a billion dollars?

Yes, this signals that the taxmen and taxwomen cometh, but we already knew that much. But if Republicans and Democrats can agree that this commission melding made no sense, is this a harbinger of veto overrides to come?

I might not go that far quite yet, but the lack of respect the administration received in the committee, the short shrift the idea was given and, especially, the hyperbole that flowed as they killed it was something to behold.

Lt. Gov. Brian Krolicki, who not coincidentally oversees both commissions, called the decision to reject the administration plan “incredibly wise,” the Associated Press reported. Democratic Assemblyman Joe Hogan told the Las Vegas Sun it “would be tragic to sacrifice these high-caliber agencies.”

Incredibly wise to save? Tragic if they had not been preserved? A little much, perhaps?

The rhetorical excesses aside, the true chance for wisdom and to avoid tragic cuts will come later when lawmakers confront bigger reductions in Health and Human Services and education, especially.

You saw a preview of those tougher, more meaningful decisions when another panel removed a thoughtless cap on Nevada CheckUp, a program designed to help children who cannot afford health care. This is the best example of the lack of deliberation that went into the administration’s budget proposal: A program that has been proven to be effective but not as efficient because of resources is capped. Nevada Checkup provides health care for about 25,000 children, about half of those eligible — and there are 3,000 applicants on a waiting list.

So while it is a sign of lawmakers being, ahem, incredibly wise that they would reject the cap, it once again raises the question of what they will do as they continue to take away cuts proposed by Ø. They put out the story this week that the best laid plans of Democrats often go awry and they missed their deadline to have the budget completed. But by Friday, they say, they will know where they are.

And whatever the number is that they find is needed for new revenue, there eventually will be real debate — assuming it all doesn’t take place behind closed doors — over what cannot be restored. That’s where the really difficult decisions will come, where the rhetoric will have to be reconciled with reality and where the tax plans will have to either be sold to a skeptical public or spun into mush by so-called leaders searching for political cover.

If they don’t forcefully make the case for what they are doing, if they settle for half- or quarter-measures instead of preserving what they know must be preserved, they will not be making incredibly wise choices and that, ultimately, will be seen as tragic.