Washingtonians are literally going to die because of the $700 million that legislators hacked out of the state budget in a special session on December 11. At least that’s what advocates for the poor and downtrodden say.
“Will people die?” asked Rebecca Kavoussi of the Community Health Network of Washington after legislators finished slashing funds for educational institutions, disadvantaged families, and the disabled.
“Yes.”
This, by the way, is just the beginning.
The $700 million cut was part of the legislature’s attempt to deal with a $1.1 billion shortfall that needs to be resolved by July, when the state’s current two-year budget cycle ends. But in January, when the legislature convenes during regular session, the hurt will compound as lawmakers take up the next two-year budget. The shortfall that’s projected for the next two years: $4.6 billion.
Just how bad is that?
Look at it this way: Over the last five years, we’ve cut $5.1 billion from Washington’s budget. We’re about to cut $1.1 billion more before July, and then, over the next two years, another $4.6 billion.
Or, just look at it this way: If things feel really bad now, they’re about to get twice as really bad. More education cuts. More health-care cuts. The disappearance of programs few think should disappear.
Glenn Kuper, spokesperson for the state’s Office of Financial Management, says that because of depressed revenues, the budget will reflect the worst of the recession well into the future, even though some are predicting a modest recovery soon. “We’re likely to keep bouncing along the bottom,” Kuper says, “for at least the next two-year budget.”
A quick look at the state’s main sources of revenue explains why. Our regressive sales tax makes up 52 percent of state revenue, so when people buy less, the state’s balance sheets go into free fall fast. Other major sources of state income: business taxes, which shrink when businesses are closing right and left; property taxes, which drop when property values are falling; and the real-estate excise tax, which isn’t much good when no one’s buying and selling real estate.
On that cheery note, here’s what disappeared during that budget-cutting bonanza on December 11:
Higher education: Legislators cut $11.4 million from the University of Washington’s budget, $7.5 million from Washington State University, $2 million from Western Washington University, $777,000 from the Evergreen State College, and $26 million from the state’s community and technical colleges.
Department of Corrections: Legislators closed McNeil Island Corrections Center, saving $3.3 million; cut the number of corrections workers, saving $13 million; and reduced electronic home monitoring, saving $879,000.
Children and Family Services: Legislators reduced foster-parent recruitment, saving $176,000, and reduced the number of state workers treating chemical dependency, saving $564,000.
Disability Lifeline: Legislators cut this program for the disabled by $12 million, reflecting a 21 percent decrease in the amount that will be put in monthly checks to people on the lifeline. The checks were $339. They’ll now be $268.
Plus: more furloughs and hiring freezes across all state departments!
And remember: That’s just to help get us through July of 2011. In January, when the people down in Olympia try to figure out how to get us through July of 2013, these cuts will look like little scrapes.
(P.S. Tens of millions of dollars are set to be pulled from state mental-health funding in January. Go here for the scary details.) 
Shameful.
I’s no longer a figure of speech or hyperbole to say, “Republicans want poor people to drop quietly dead.” It’s now reality.
[insert photo of Tim Eyman laughing and waving a fistful of $100-dollar bills as he unplugs a 6-year-old child’s kidney-dialysis machine]
Yes, it is sad that necessary programmes and municipal staff are going to be cut.
But in the end, the voters shall only have themselves to blame: approving the income tax would have given Gov. Gregoire more latitude in solving WA’s budget woes.
While Eyman’s mad anti-tax initiatives have been happily struck down, he ended up victorious when WA voters agreed with the GOP that rich people shouldn’t pay their fair share.
We all know this; why is it such a bloody shock now?
hey number 1 its dems you voted for that dug the hole. and the governor you just had to re elect over and over. you fucked your selves, don’t start bitching now.
1. ERIC CARTMAN you’re an idiot
and
2. This is nothing more than a side effect of having too many people. There shouldn’t be so many humans and they definitely shouldn’t be so reliant on the government. The government should serve two purposes: Protect us from invasion and enforce breeding controls to lower the population to a less destructive and unsustainable number.
well seeds as long as you don’t reproduce i think we will be fine.i have an idea, china shares your thoughts on population control , why don’t you go there?!
I have an idea ERIC CARTMAN, why don’t you go back to whatever midwest shithole spawned you?
HOW MANY TIMES DO I HAVE TO TELL YOUR STUPID ASS I WAS BORN AND RAISED IN SEATTLE YOU FUCKING DUMBSHIT! WHY DON’T YOU CRAWL BACK INTO WHAT EVER ASSHOLE YOU JUST CRAWLED OUT OF?
Isn’t it time to ask why the state has a balanced-budget requirement? Why the state can’t borrow money? Why the state doesn’t start a bank (since banks are the main source of money creation due to the fractional reserve system) like North Dakota (which is the only state that has a budget surplus)?
People really need to understand money and where it comes from, and challenge the notion that banks have some sort of divine right to be the sole money creators. Lincoln, the first Republican president, printed over $400 million greenbacks to raise debt-free money without borrowing or increasing taxes.
We need to abandon the old feudal-era economics that dictate the state has to fund itself with taxes. In fact as Japan proves with its 200% debt-to-gdp ratio, it is possible to print money without inflation. We need to learn from Japan (which owns almost as much US foreign debt as China does), and from China too whose money supply is directly controlled by the government. The free market is not the best creator and allocator of resources; our elected officials should create money without attaching debt to it and give it to people directly, and encourage innovation with challenges. Economics is not the central problem of mankind; the advance of knowledge and innovation is, because that is what increases life expectancy and the other measures of standard of living.
But don’t take my word for it! Do your own research, see if I’m right. Look up for yourself fractional reserve, Lincoln’s greenbacks, heterodox economics, and US foreign-owned debt…
Isn’t it time to ask why the state has a balanced-budget requirement? Why the state can’t borrow money? Why the state doesn’t start a bank (since banks are the main source of money creation due to the fractional reserve system) like North Dakota (which is the only state that has a budget surplus)?
People really need to understand money and where it comes from, and challenge the notion that banks have some sort of divine right to be the sole money creators. Lincoln, the first Republican president, printed over $400 million greenbacks to raise debt-free money without borrowing or increasing taxes.
We need to abandon the old feudal-era economics that dictate the state has to fund itself with taxes. In fact as Japan proves with its 200% debt-to-gdp ratio, it is possible to print money without inflation. We need to learn from Japan (which owns almost as much US foreign debt as China does), and from China too whose money supply is directly controlled by the government. The free market is not the best creator and allocator of resources; our elected officials should create money without attaching debt to it and give it to people directly, and encourage innovation with challenges. Economics is not the central problem of mankind; the advance of knowledge and innovation is, because that is what increases life expectancy and the other measures of standard of living.
But don’t take my word for it! Do your own research, see if I’m right. Look up for yourself fractional reserve, Lincoln’s greenbacks, heterodox economics, and US foreign-owned debt…
Sorry for the double post, I was trying to add links and inadvertently posted twice.
Might as well add some other links: fractional reserve (note the money multiplier is 10 for the US’s 10% reserve requirement, so banks can create 10 times as much money as they take in – and they charge you interest for the privilege of lending it to you, and when they lose money it is basically the money they created in the first place so is it really a loss?
File:Components_of_US_Money_supply.svg“>http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Compon… is a graph of the increase in the US money supply since 1959 – note that M2 is created by the free market, not the govt, and it has increased almost exponentially since the mid-1990s, yet where was the inflation?
Well it mangled the last link 🙂 Let me try again: money supply (scroll down for the graph I was trying to post).