January 18, 2006
Five years ago, state government was rolling in an unexpected surplus. Gov. Parris N. Glendening took advantage and spent most every dime. He was condemned by conservatives for exceeding the state's spending affordability limit. And the day after his budget was approved by the General Assembly, we opined that the too-generous level of state spending would lead to "major budget woes" within the year.
Well, that collapse came. Surpluses turned into projected budget deficits. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr. should remember. After all, the financial turmoil helped get him elected governor in 2002. But you wouldn't know it from the record $29.6 billion budget the governor announced yesterday. He appears headed on exactly the same course.
Mr. Ehrlich's proposal represents the largest-ever increase in state spending and is more than $200 million above the legislature's spending affordability limit. But what's truly remarkable is that Mr. Ehrlich knows the good times can't last. His own projections assume that the growth of state spending will exceed tax revenue. He would balance the next two budgets by dipping heavily into the state's surplus. The era of billion-dollar budget deficits - or draconian cuts in the budget - would not be far behind. This is not so much an example of foolishly ignoring the past as willfully replicating it.
Mr. Ehrlich's plan is not without merit. Far from it. Like Mr. Glendening, he wants to use a considerable portion of the money to enhance public education and to finance other worthy programs. This includes paying higher salaries to state police and correctional officers, financing stem cell research, and unabashedly supporting a host of other initiatives.
But it's hard to endorse a management philosophy that doesn't look beyond 2006 - or take into account the possibility that the economy might eventually sour. That's why Mr. Ehrlich's proposed 2-cent reduction in the state's property tax rate is so poorly timed. How can you reduce taxes now when it appears that Maryland will face what amounts to a budget deficit in 2008?
Democrats will grouse that a suddenly liberal Mr. Ehrlich is trying to buy his re-election. They may be right. Doing the right thing - such as setting aside more money to cover rising health and pension costs - won't necessarily get a governor big headlines. But the sheer hypocrisy of a self-proclaimed fiscal conservative pulling a "Spendening" - doling out taxpayer money faster than it comes into the state treasury - shouldn't go unnoticed by voters.
