Former Senator: Quit treating the budget like a race

Every year we suffer through the dance with the Republicans and the Democrats on the state budget.

The Republicans argue the virtues of a structurally balanced budget no matter what, while the Democrats try to make the case that any proposed cuts are not really necessary. The public pays little attention until the consequences impact them.

This has been going on for years in Arizona and it's a classic example of the politics of budgeting.

This year's dance was no different, except that Republican legislative leaders and a new Republican governor wanted to get the budget done in record time. This may not seem strange to the casual observer, but considering the magnitude of the budget decisions and the consequences to our educational institutions and health care providers, it was unusual.

But to me, when you consider the politics, it made perfect sense for those in power (the conservatives) to want it done quickly and here's why:

April always tells the story on state revenue collections. The Joint Legislative Budget Committee is notorious for "low balling" the revenue forecast. So, this year (with April numbers) is now shaping up to be like four out of the last five years. JLBC "low balled" the revenue forecast again (its forecast was used as the basis for setting the budget).

What does this mean? It means that state revenues are coming in tens of millions of dollars higher that the dire budget figures that were promulgated by the JLBC throughout the legislation session. The numbers could be hundreds of millions higher than what was used for the enacted fiscal year 2016 budget.

This explains the race by the conservatives to get the budget done before the April numbers began to shine light on the semi-closed process. The politics of the budget from the standpoint of the conservatives are to cut and shrink the size of government.

Is this budget truly going to attract new business and create job opportunities? I doubt it, because education funding is the lowest priority of this governor and this Legislature. Let's not forget the fact that our educational institutions, a constitutional priority, bore the brunt of the cuts.

It is time to stop this nonsense and return to a more transparent and logical process, using legislative subcommittees to add transparency and, more importantly, to at least appear to take the politics out of budgeting in Arizona.

At one time not so long ago, things were transparently civilized. Now Arizona continues the race to the bottom.

Carolyn S. Allen served 16 years in the Legislature (1995-2010), including time as the House majority leader.