Talking with Dan Rodricks on WYPR about Maryland's budget, noon to 1. 88.1 FM.

Posted by Jay Hancock at 10:46 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
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Good story by Paul West on the connection between Democratic Sen. Barbara Mikulski's earmarked federal defense spending and donors to her campaign. She directed tens of millions of dollars in defense spending to top campaign donors Northrop Grumman, Thales Communications and L-3 Communications. She responds by saying it's all for the country and the hard-fighting troops.

"My top priority," the senator said in a statement, "is to ensure that Americans serving on the front lines have the funding, equipment and technology they need to protect our nation."

Republican Rep. Roscoe Bartlett, another Maryland defense-earmark overachiever, has a more interesting response. He doesn't know who his campaign donors are, an aide says.

Lisa Wright, a longtime Bartlett aide, said the Western Maryland congressman relies on his experience as a scientist in requesting earmarks and deliberately stays ignorant about campaign donors.

Bartlett "avoids anything to do with campaign funding," she said. His campaign organization routinely makes the names of his donors public, as required by federal election law. But the aide, asked if Bartlett knew that Northrop Grumman was a prime funding source for his re-election efforts, replied, "I sincerely doubt it."

Bartlett is enough of a nonconformist and idealist that I believe her.

Posted by Jay Hancock at 10:13 AM | Permalink | Comments (3)
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Researchers at the University of Maryland found that -- surprise! -- most Twitter content from Congress was self-promoting stuff linked to press releases or media appearances. What sort of vain, self-promoting kind of person would use the Internet to talk about a media appearance? (Hint: I'll be on WBAL at 2 this afternoon to talk about Constellation Energy and Electricite de France.)

Actually, vacuous Twitter content is what we want to see from our public servants, if we're going to see anything. It can easily be produced by lackeys and interns, saving the congresswoman or senator or governor or whoever for important stuff. Thus, Maryland Comptroller Peter Franchot's tweet, in reponse to the Congress/Twitter story:

i'm all about constituent interaction, could teach those congressmen

may not be the greatest thing. Do we need the chief executive of the state's revenue authority frequently tweeting and twerping in person? Maybe when we can fit the Maryland tax form on Twitter, but not until.

Likewise, Missouri Sen. Claire McCaskill was named best tweeter by the UM folks because it's obvious she creates her own content, like this:

Yes @tigeranniemac that was me at Target in the soap aisle. You shoulda said hi. Was with my daughter Lily. We're very friendly."

No. Please Sen. McCaskill. This is not good use of your time. You're on the Committee on Armed Services and the Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs. Please go learn about terrorists and Afghanistan. Leave the tweets to the PR people.

Posted by Jay Hancock at 11:11 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)
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The new, projected numbers from the Board of Revenue Esimates are shocking. After all the cuts the state has already made (~$4 billion), it looks like it will have $2 billion too little to balance the books next fiscal year, writes Laura Smitherman. That's on top of another $230 million in cuts that will probably be needed this year. People knew there would be new hole. They didn't know it would look this big.

It's true the economy is hurting and Maryland has a long-term structural budget imbalance. But I find it hard to believe that next year's gap will be as big as $2 billion. The economy seems to be recovering. My guess is that the Board of Revenue estimates is being too pessimistic. After having repeatedly revised tax-collection projections downward, they probably don't want to do it again. That big, scary number will also increase political pressure to get slots up and going, and that could fill a decent part of the void by itself.

Posted by Jay Hancock at 12:05 PM | Permalink | Comments (13)
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Monday on the Rodricks show on WYPR (FM-88.1) at 1:00 we'll be discussing the budget problems facing Maryland and Baltimore and this post I made last week: Union should be thrilled with furloughs, not outraged.

Talk about it here. Or call us on air after 1:00 at 410/662-8780. Here is some homework to put things in perspective and give you some ideas.

-- State spending will decline for the second year in a row for the fiscal year that ends in June, to under $14 billion for the General Fund. Two years ago it was $14.6 billion.

-- Gov. O'Malley has cut more than $4 billion in spending since he took office. (The slide says $3.5 billion, but it has gone up.)

-- Until now he has cut more than 2,000 positions with state government, but hardly any were layoffs. Last week the Board of Public Works approved layoffs for a couple hundred state workers as well as more extensive furloughs for those who remain.

-- Even with the cuts announced last week, there is probably still a gap between projected revenue and projected spending.

-- To avoid layoffs and reduce furloughs, the government employees union wanted the legislature to approve combined tax reporting for businesses.which reduces companies' opportunity to game one state's tax system against another's. But the assembly can't do that until next year, and O'Malley faces a budget crisis now. Combined reporting would raise between $40 million, on the low end of estimates, to more than $100 million a year, on the high end. In a vacuum, combined reporting is a decent idea, but O'Malley already signed off on huge tax increases two years ago, including on corporations. It'll be tough to raise corporate taxes again now.

-- After the 2007 increases, Maryland's state and local tax burden is 4th highest in the nation, according to the Tax Foundation.

Posted by Jay Hancock at 7:51 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)
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I hope Patrick Moran, Maryland head of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, is profusely thanking Gov. Martin O'Malley behind the scenes after having blasted him publicly for cost-cutting plans emerging this week.

The union is "incredibly disappointed" that O'Malley will furlough lay off a couple hundred employees and furlough 70,000 others for a few days, Moran told WBAL TV. O'Malley decided to "balance the budget on the backs of state workers and residents," he said on the union's Web site. "Even in these tough times, it is essential that we remember our priorities in Maryland, and that the people of this state come first."

The people of this state! The people of this state face a 7.4 percent unemployment rate. About 224,000 are unemployed. That's over 100,000 more than two years ago. The people of this state got one of the biggest tax increases in history two years ago, when O'Malley increased the sales tax, the income tax, the cigarette tax, the corporate income tax and the vehicle titling tax all at the same time. The people of this state have seen the value of their houses plunge, medical costs rise and take-home pay go flat.

And yet as the recession has deepened O'Malley has bent himself into curlicues to avoid reducing state government employment, which is one of the biggest expenses and a natural place to look for crucial savings. State government has been immune to the kind of layoff pain that has been routine at manufacturers, banks and construction companies. The economy is shrinking. Tax revenue is plunging. What O'Malley is doing is the minimum. Moran ought to be thrilled.

UPDATE: A commenter notes correctly that O'Malley has eliminated 2,700 positions already, which I should have mentioned. But most of these did not involve layoffs, and in the grand scheme such action is still pretty minimal. Look at what's going on in California.

Posted by Jay Hancock at 6:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (63)
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The New York Times reports:

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger returned home from a White House visit on Wednesday to find the state dangerously broke, his constituents defiant after a special election on Tuesday and calls for a constitutional convention — six months ago little more than a wonkish whisper — a cacophony.

As the notion of California as ungovernable grows stronger than ever, Mr. Schwarzenegger, a Republican, has expressed support for a convention to address such things as the state’s arcane budget requirements and its process for proliferate ballot initiatives, both of which necessitated Tuesday’s statewide vote on budget matters approved months ago by state lawmakers.

H.L Mencken: "Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want, and deserve to get it good and hard."

California's tendency to require statewide ballots on anything and everything is the latest evidence that direct, Athenian-style democracy may not be a great idea. The founders set up a system of representative democracy for a good reason.

Posted by Jay Hancock at 10:51 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)
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