Politics

The pain is real, but it's not necessary

By STEVE BOUSQUET, Tallahassee Bureau Chief
Published September 1, 2007

With all the talk of pain and suffering in the Capitol these days, you would think a personal injury lawyers' convention was in town.

But it's only the Legislature, having to cut $1-billion in spending to wipe all that red ink off the balance sheet.

Of course, this pain and suffering is mostly self-inflicted by legislators themselves.

"What's the old saying? Desperate times require desperate measures," said Secretary of State Kurt Browning, who proposed cutting state aid to libraries by $5-million out of $32-million in a state that not long ago had a literacy campaign with the theme "Just read, Florida!"

Browning made it clear he doesn't want to punish libraries, but, facing the same 4 percent spending cut as other agencies, he has little choice.

His marching orders are to cut general revenue spending, the kind paid for with recurring tax collections. Libraries are among the few programs that fit the bill.

At the other end of the Capitol, University of Florida president Bernie Machen spoke of UF falling further behind other big schools.

In the latest U.S. News & World Report ranking of colleges and universities, he told lawmakers, UF is a decidedly mediocre 123rd in a benchmark category of faculty resources, defined as teacher salaries, class sizes and student-teacher ratios.

He said the ranking "reflects our deteriorating undergraduate expenditures for students."

Some people are asking why it has to be this way.

Why, they ask, do seniors, sick kids and students have to grovel for nickels and dimes from a tightfisted Legislature while more than $20-billion in goods and services enjoy tax-free status?

Karen Woodall is one of those people.

A tireless lobbyist for women and children, she plans to prod legislators to consider repealing some of those prized sales tax exemptions or rebates - say, for bottled water, pro sports stadiums, newspaper and magazine inserts and livestock feed.

If the state would lift those tax breaks, she argues, it wouldn't have to cut health and human services.

"They want to put people waiting for liver transplants on the chopping block, but they won't touch bottled water," Woodall said. "It doesn't make any sense."

Woodall knows she is probably taking on a lost cause.

She will get support from Senate Democrats, and maybe a few Republicans, in the special session starting in mid September, but that's about it.

When times are good, there's no urgency to review the state's tax base. When times are bad, as they are now, the argument is that raising taxes makes things worse.

Talk of repealing sales tax exemptions always gets twisted into a tax increase, rather than what it really is: re-examining a special treatment for a special interest that may have outlived its usefulness. This is why the rhetoric about "pain and suffering" is self-inflicted by legislators.

When you hear lawmakers and Gov. Charlie Crist say they have no alternative but to carry out these "very painful, very difficult" cuts, remember that they do have a choice.

They can always take a fresh look at the Florida tax structure that got them in this mess in the first place.

Steve Bousquet can be reached at bousquet@sptimes.com.

[Last modified August 31, 2007, 23:31:33]