Lawmakers bristle at prioritizing projects
Published Saturday, May 3, 2008
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Stumble It!JUNEAU — Lawmakers are bristling at Gov. Sarah Palin’s request that they prioritize their lists of district projects in the capital budget.
Palin made her request after receiving the $3.5 billion budget, which includes $2.9 billion in mostly equipment and construction projects around the state.
Palin said the lists would be part of a comprehensive review of the projects.
In a letter to Palin Friday, finance committee co-chairmen Rep. Kevin Meyer, R-Anchorage, and Sen. Bert Stedman, R-Sitka, said ranking one project over another would create adversarial relationships between communities, neighborhoods and constituents.
“I have a lot of schools, and it’s almost impossible to prioritize one school over another. And I know Bert is having the same problem because he’s got a lot of different small communities and he doesn’t want to pit one against the other,” Meyer said.
The budget, including statewide requests such as roads and bridges from Palin and district requests from legislators, was transmitted to the governor on Wednesday. That means she has until May 23 to decide if she will to sign the budget or use her line item veto.
She infuriated lawmakers last year by vetoing scores of their projects. She said spending was too high and the items didn’t rise to the level of her life, health safety and education priorities.
Meyer said lawmakers are nervous about how she would use a prioritized list of projects.
“That is going to weigh heavily on legislators’ minds that we’re just kind of flagging ‘veto here,’” Meyer said. “Everything we put in there was pretty high priority, or we wouldn’t have put it in.”
Many of the projects stricken last year were back on the table this year. Lawmakers reinserted them into the supplemental budget that covers cost overruns in the current year and some of those projects were approved with that budget. Others were put in the capital budget with Palin’s tacit agreement not to strike them.
Meyer said Palin will have a tougher time justifying line item vetoes this year after having allowed those projects back in.
In her e-mail to legislators Wednesday that asked for the prioritized lists, Palin also urged them to complete their back up information on each project.
Stedman said legislators have done a particularly good job of that this year.
“I’m confident this is the best year ever that the legislature has been able to deliver data to the governor for review,” he said.
Palins’ budget director Karen Rehfeld said she understands the pressures that lawmakers face and so far they have been cooperative in providing comprehensive information, she said.
“I understand some of their reluctance. I just want to make sure that when we made decisions that we understand what their priorities are. Because you hate to make a decision and have them go ‘Gee, that was really important to me,’” she said.
Rehfeld said the capital budget includes 927 projects added by lawmakers “so there’s a lot to look at here.”
Community Discussion
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Hmmm, sounds like an opportunity for each representative to tell Gov. Palin which projects are most important to each district.
Successful people prioritize -- decide whether to buy food, heating fuel, gasoline, or go to the movies.
If the people from a district can't decide what's most important to them -- or trust their representatives to do it -- then they should leave it up to Juneau to decide for them.
Governor Palin might want to see if there is a fair distribution of the "Public Money" or whether all the pork is in the Chairman's District.
MORE FOR THE HAVE'S AND NOTHING FOR THE HAVE NOT'S.
Prioritizing of the PUBLIC wants and needs OR prioritizing the elected politician wants are not necessarily the same thing.
I must admit that I didn't vote for Governor Sarah Palin and I wanted to dislike her from the moment the election results were announced.
But, as I continue to follow her actions, it seems to me that Alaska got a great deal when Sarah Palin became governor.
She has consistently held the Legislature accountable for their actions. Funny how the little piggies squeal now that there is adult supervision at the trough.
If the legislators do not have the courage to public state which projects are most important then what use are they?
Project importance was self fulfulling upon inclusion into the budget. (The wrangling already took place when requests that numbered over 2,000 according to another news story, was pared down to 900) Where and why it came forth is presented in the bill on the leg finance website. Pretty "open and transparent" by the legislators on the why and where they came forth. They were driven by community, agency, and administration requests.
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