Balancing budgets, citizens' needs

KENNETT, Mo. -- When Gov. Bob Holden submitted his proposed state budget for fiscal year 2003 just three months ago, he estimated his spending plan of $19.1 billion could be balanced with an infusion of $6.7 billion in general-revenue tax collections.

The reason the latter figure was -- and is -- so important, constituting more than one-third of all available dollars to state government, is that no one was -- or is -- able to supply an accurate figure on a critical source of money that is so dependent on outside factors, including the aftermath of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks and the mood of consumers in the Show Me State.

Proceeds from general revenue supply the basic funding for local schools, state colleges and universities, welfare assistance programs, mental and public health services, the salaries of the vast majority of state employees, even the funds that are returned to taxpayers in the form of income-tax refunds and Hancock Amendment outlays.

So that Missourians can more fully understand the crisis that has literally paralyzed our elected officials in Jefferson City, it should be noted that even if Holden's estimates listed above are right on the mark, the state would have to find an additional $237 million to meet the constitutional requirement of a balanced budget.

If this task sounds easy to you, then please remember that continuing inflation has caused some of the problem which has been enhanced by the introduction of new public-assistance programs including those designed to meet the health needs of children in low-income families, plus the implementation of programs required by the federal government and the shifting of resources to cover the escalating costs of modern medicine and pharmaceuticals.

Check with your own family's bean-counter to determine if prices have diminished in any of the basic services received in your own household -- and then check to determine how many of these so-called luxuries you are able, or willing, to eliminate.

Not an easy task, eh?

None of this is meant to exonerate Holden, who is guilty of at least conveying considerable fiscal irresponsibility at the time of his inauguration, but the chief executive has little or no power over the economic conditions that have an impact on the state's general-revenue collections. He can merely suggest that taxpayers contribute their fair share of state expenses while exercising no power over whether the average Missouri consumer buys a new washing machine or new automobile or even whether he buys on the Internet to avoid paying anything in state sales taxes.

(Indeed, the real culprit of some of this tax revenue malaise in Jefferson City can be traced to the efforts of state and federal elected officials who keep insisting that, for a number of weird reasons, consumers should be rewarded for buying high-ticket items from out of the state sellers over the Internet by freeing them from the burden of paying legally levied sales taxes. The truth is that these obviously misguided politicians are afraid of encountering heat from their scofflaw constituents who purposely seek to avoid their fair share of state financing. I don't recall such advantages being given to shoppers who bought a refrigerator over the newly invented telephone nor do I remember any exemptions for those who ordered taxable merchandise by way of the old-fashioned mail-order system.)

Confronted with this mish-mash of conflicting events -- a terrorist-inspired recession, consumer caution as U.S. troops are rushed to Godforsaken lands around the globe, haunting memories of the World Trade Center and Pentagon attacks and the sickening discovery of the manipulative misdeeds of the Enron bandits -- the results of which have resulted in a literal collapse of intelligent life in our state Capitol in Jefferson City. It hasn't been a pretty sight, and the odds are that it will grow even more worse in the weeks ahead unless there is some sign of leadership from either party in an effort to restore some degree of sanity to the fiscal health of our great state.

The unfortunate gridlock in Jefferson City has more than one cause. Unfortunately there are several factors that have entered into the fray of how to maintain existing services and still meet the growing needs of a state population.

First and foremost is the existing political climate in Jefferson City, a parochial village that pays far more attention to the predominance of political power than ever crosses the screen of the rest of the state. The governor and a small majority in the lower chamber are Democrats while the ruling force in the upper chamber is provided by Republicans.

Partisan splits like this need not prove fatal if all parties are agreeable to cooperating and accepting reasonable solutions that lead to acceptable compromises. There hasn't been much civility passed between these opposing forces since the last election, not unless there is some mystical, transforming moment in Cole County is there likely to be any end to this myopic mess.

Second, compromises are hard to achieve under the best of conditions, but when one party or the other reaches the conclusion that more is to be gained by continuing the argument than resolving it, satisfactory solutions become virtually impossible.

Third, public disgust can prevent a real-life compromise from occurring, particularly when there are repeated instances in which state-sponsored inefficiency, bureaucratic errors and misjudgment and inexcusably poor state oversight create citizen disgust. John Q. Citizen is unlikely to demand that this kind of normalcy be reinforced and continued.

Balancing Missouri's budget is like going to heaven. Everyone wants to do it, but no one wants to make the trip.

Jack Stapleton is the editor of Missouri News & Editorial Service.