Editorial: No simple answers for state budget

It’s early, but the preliminary sparring over Washington’s budget already is underway.

Gov. Jay Inslee has directed state agencies to work up budgets that reflect 15 percent spending cuts, notably excepting big expenditures such as K-12 education, debt service, pensions and Medicaid, which is hands-off as far as the federal government is concerned.

Still in play are higher education and corrections, to name two.

But the Legislature is committed to holding tuition flat for at least one more year. Students and families have earned a breather from the spiraling costs that force them to borrow more money, or postpone the education they need, and the state should encourage college attendance if the Washington economy is going to have a 21st century workforce.

The prison system probably can be operated more cheaply, but only if a newly formed task force can identify alternatives to incarceration that can be recommended to lawmakers before the 2015 session starts. A 15 percent cut would put the corrections system in a $200 million hole.

Inslee’s request has some agencies and workers on a war footing. Republicans are dismissing the move as fear mongering intended to scare constituencies that benefit from many programs that may be cut. Those folks will be more likely to go to the polls in November if they believe the ax will fall in January.

The hope on all sides is that a November update of the state revenue forecast will build on the $387 million in the most recent projection. But just keeping spending for all state programs on their current path will require an additional $700 million to pay all the bills.

That does not include upwards of $1 billion to meet the state Supreme Court’s demand for more K-12 spending, nor the costs of potential pay increases for state employees who have not received a raise since 2008 except through seniority. Same thing for teachers.

Inslee and his representatives have the authority to negotiate those contracts in private, with legislators limited to an up-or-down endorsement with no changes. He reportedly has told employee gatherings the six-year freeze is unfair.

He hasn’t said as much to Washington taxpayers.

Thanks to changes made two years ago, a budget not only has to balance for one biennium, it must balance for two. That stopped the gaming that produced a break-even spending plan only by pushing known costs out two years, when it would be another Legislature’s problem.

Credit-rating agencies took notice, and the change has lowered state borrowing costs.

With an election coming up, it may be too much to ask that everyone be candid about the choices ahead, although nobody has tried to sugarcoat the process either.

On transportation improvements, the most urgent of state needs, there is nothing but silence.

With primary ballots due to go out the middle of next month, voters should start pressing candidates for their response to Washington’s budget pressures, and what choices they would make in response. Don’t accept simple answers. There aren’t any.