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| published Sunday, March 23, 2008 |
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. The Senate hightailed it out of town on Thursday. Ostensibly, they were frustrated with the House for holding up legislation they wanted. Some said they did not want to be in town when the final list of who is challenging them for election came out on Friday. Only two senators are retiring and one is leaving to run for county commission. Only two House members are retiring and four are running for the senate. That means 100 out of 105 legislators expect voters to return them to the legislature. 35 got their wish at 5pm on Friday. They were effectively re-elected when no one filed to challenge them. 113 non-incumbents have taken the plunge to challenge the rest of them.
. Friday marked the beginning of Spring Break for thousands of families in Idaho. They’ll be hitting the road navigating traffic cones and other obstacles that mark the beginning of highway construction. Back in January, the legislature heard about the massive shortfall in road construction needs (over $200 million) that cannot be addressed without more funds. As of today, dozens of bills have been introduced but none enacted. The hold up: the House insists that before they agree to investing any more money in the highway fund, the Department of Transportation must undergo a comprehensive performance audit (costing over a half million dollars). The House finally passed the audit bill (HCR 50) on Monday. House leaders pulled the road funding bills that have emerged from the House Transportation Committee and will not vote until the Senate passes the audit bill. The Senate Transportation Committee obliged on Thursday.
Even if a performance audit is completed, will the Governor pay attention? This week Gov. Butch Otter vetoed parts of two bills to wipe out a $16.8 million investment in community-based substance-abuse treatment. He used the line-item veto on parts of Senate Bill 1458 and House Bill 608. He admitted that more community-based treatment is needed in Idaho but claimed there isn’t enough evidence to show that programs such as drug courts are working. Proponents in the legislature, including Rep. Margaret Henbest (D-Boise) and Rep. Maxine Bell (R-Jerome) were amazed at the veto since the Office of Performance Evaluations reports that outcomes are being tracked exactly how budget writers required in previous evaluations. Legislators on the budget committee have gradually seen the light: investing in effective treatment on the community level saves taxpayers millions in future prison costs. Budget writers are now trying to figure out if they should ask their colleagues to override the veto. Contact your legislator to override the vetoes.
. Republican senators are being far more obliging to the Governor on his request to slash medical benefits for people who have invested their lives working for us as state employees. On Wednesday, the Senate passed Senate Bill 1447aa to cap medical benefits for current retirees and eliminate medical retirement benefits for future state workers. Sponsors, including Senators Joe Stegner and Charles Coiner and Rep. Ken Roberts want to reduce the state's responsibility to retirees over the next eight years from $442 million to $136 million. More than 3,000 retired state employees currently receive state medical benefits.
. Idahoans know that heavy Spring rain and sudden thaws can mean dangerous mud slides that can wipe out whole communities. The House triggered its own mudslide on Friday when it passed two huge bills that will force major property tax shifts. Homeowners, community leaders, and city and county government are bracing themselves. First, the House passed HB 599 by a 39-31 vote margin. Then they passed HJR 4 by a margin of 51-19. (See last week’s UVEyeOpener for description of these bills). It is clear from the vote on the latter that many yes votes came from House members who are hoping the Senate will kill it. If these things make it through the process, local taxpayers will be cleaning up the mess for generations. Contact your state senator and urge them stop the shift and vote NO on HB 599 and HJR 4.
The problem with special interest tax breaks is that once they are on the books, they are seldom evaluated to determine if they actually produce the benefits that lobbyists promise. Senate Bill 1315 was introduced to do precisely that but Senate Republican leaders have refused to hold a hearing on it. After ignoring the issue all session, House Republican leaders are finally moving to repeal two of the tax breaks that an interim committee said are no longer justified. House Bill 661 repeals some corporate tax credits that lobbyists promised would ensure more corporations will locate their headquarters in Idaho. The opposite occurred after some high profile mergers. Repealing the credits is a reminder that breaks like these are meaningless to a global corporation focused on market share elsewhere. It passed the house on Friday. House Bill 664 repeals a tax credit to lure businesses to conduct research. The repeal tacitly acknowledges that public invests in higher education research is far more effective and benefits more businesses than a tax break. It is being held up for amendments.
. Kudos to Rep. Nicole LeFavour for not giving up. It has been an extraordinarily difficult task to get most of her colleagues to apply objective standards to tax exemptions. Those lobbyists with the most power and influence tend to get what they want (as we’ve seen by the ease with which big corporations have pushed through their exemptions and the struggle that ordinary taxpayers have had to ease the impact of the sales tax on food). The vast majority of non-profit organizations pay sales tax on their purchases. However, there are some that have secured exemptions. There are no written criteria to help sort through which groups deserve exemptions and which do not. House Bill 674 will set those standards rather than require each group to come separately to the Legislature seeking a break.
. To the Bush Administration, the role of government is not to invest in helping us improve our communities but to collect as much information about us and centralize control of that information. That’s the premise behind the so-called “Real ID Act.” It has generated such a strong public outcry that state governments are responding. 17 states have passed laws opposing its enforcement. Even legislatures dominated by the president’s own party cannot ignore public opposition. Last year, Idaho's legislature passed a non-binding memorial. Last week, the Idaho House unanimously passed House Bill 606 which directs Idaho’s Department of Transportation not to implement the Real ID Act. Pressure from the Bush Administration to tow the party line is mounting but the Senate State Affairs Committee has kept the bill alive and will continue hearing the bill on Monday, March 24.
There are several bills that legislative leaders have refused to schedule for hearing. Public input, it seems, is irrelevant to their deliberations. One is Senate Bill 1323 that has been in Sen. Curt McKenzie’s drawer since January 22. It would simply extend the protection of Idaho’s Human Rights Act from discrimination based on sexual orientation or gender identity. A recent study found that 63 percent of Idahoans agree that it should be illegal to fire someone simply because they are gay or lesbian. Please join the Idaho Women’s Network, The Interfaith Alliance, Idaho Equality, and the ACLU of Idaho on the south side of the Statehouse Annex to demand a public hearing. The rally is at 12:30pm on Wednesday, March 26th.
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