Not much changed on Day One. Our state government continues to hand out benefits to already-privileged insiders in good years while making promises to everyone else, and then holding those deals harmless while sacrificing everyone else when the economy turns down. The problems with the budget process, and the results, are for the most part pretty much as I described them here when I ran as a candidate against the state legislature. But at least one thing has changed for the better in Albany. Perhaps today is a good day to point it out.
Back then, the Governor would propose a budget but the two houses of the state legislature would neither discuss it nor enact alternatives. No one would put their cards on the table. As I put it then (my readers have to put up with enough typos as it is and someone edited this for me):
"One of the strangest aspects of New York’s political culture is that is considered a shocking violation of prevailing norms if the State Assembly, State Senate, or City Council pass a budget on their own, prior to cutting a deal with the Mayor or Governor. The Mayor and Governor are required to put their cards on the table, and are expected to propose all the necessary choices and a few unnecessary ones. The legislative bodies then eliminate the unnecessary choices, claim 'victory' in their 'fight for the people' by restoring a few budget cuts, and never accept any responsibility for making choices themselves. The problem isn’t that the budget is decided by three men in a room. The problem is what happens before the three men go into the room. Nothing."
"This feckless process is well suited to feckless politicians, and must be ended. Instead, each house of the state legislature should be required to pass their own budget by April 1, and each legislator should have their salaries and reimbursements reduced (not deferred) by $1,000 for each day that a given house fails to do so."
The good news is, for whatever reason, the State Assembly and State Senate have passed their own budgets in recent years. And I just read they are doing so today. Even if one of the legislative branches passes a cynical, deceptive budget that is basically a joke, it is at least open to scrutiny under the current trend.
When Silver, Bruno, and Patterson go into the room, the areas of agreement and disagreement will all be identified up front. We won't have a budget in June, not because of a fundamental clash of deeply held beliefs, but because of the distribution of $10 million in pork, because everyone can see what the differences are.
They are likely to go into the room and sell out the future, and go back into the room again after the November election and slash NYC school aid while increasing it for the rest of the state, while agreeing to more pension enhancements and a diminished future for the young, and more tax breaks for insiders and higher tax rates for everyone else, as over and over again in the past. But the process is at least happening more efficiently.
I hope we don't go backward on this. Forget hope. Although we will probably go backward on this, it was a good thing, and better than in the past.