Colleges hit harder in House budget

OLYMPIA – A day after the Senate, House lawmakers proposed a spending plan that cuts much deeper into higher education but spares K-12 education from some major cuts.

The House plan would strip $683 million from colleges, even while raising tuition at four-year schools 10 percent a year.

“We are asking them to take the biggest cut” even though the schools are engines of innovation and worker retraining, said state Rep. Kathy Haigh, D-Shelton. “They will have to do the hardest work to figure out how to get through these tough times. But I know they can do it.”

College officials have said the cuts would be devastating.

“Words are inadequate to describe the havoc this will wreak,” Washington State University President Elson Floyd said in a prepared statement. A day earlier, his University of Washington counterpart predicted 1,000 lost jobs at UW.

The Senate plan, which would cut $513 million, is estimated to mean 2,500 fewer higher education jobs. House officials wouldn’t put a number on their proposal, saying they would leave it to the individual colleges to meet budget targets.

As for K-12 schools, the House would cut $625 million, compared with the Senate’s deeper $877 million in cuts. Much of that money would come from a voter-approved measure designed to shrink class sizes by hiring more teachers.

But even under the House plan, Haigh predicted, many teachers will lose their jobs.

“If we can keep other funds whole,” she said, “maybe we won’t lose more than 3- or 4,000 teachers.”

A top Senate budget writer, state Sen. Rodney Tom, D-Medina, also estimates that 2,000 state workers will lose their jobs.

“This is not a very pleasant day for any of us,” said House Majority Leader Lynn Kessler.

Health care would also be cut dramatically. The state would no longer buy vaccines and give them to doctors. A health coverage plan for low-income people would be cut nearly in half, as would funding for the poison control center. Hospitals and nursing homes would lose millions in state payments.

Lawmakers will spend the next few weeks agreeing on a final plan.

Spending would rise

Both budgets total about the same: $32.3 billion, compared to the $33.7 billion budget approved two years ago. That doesn’t include about $3 billion more in expected federal help. And both the House and Senate budget would reduce state pension payments by hundreds of millions of dollars and use millions more in long-term construction dollars to support the operating budget.

In other words, the state will still be spending significantly more in this budget than in the last one.

“We now know where the Enron accountants turned up: writing this budget,” said state Rep. Doug Erickson, R-Bellingham.

“Today we got the status quo,” said Erickson, indicating the House budget.

“We’re going to borrow more, we’re going to spend more, and we’re going to pass the debt on to our kids.”

He and other Republicans say the budget crisis was a chance for long-term spending reforms, but that majority Democrats resisted. Over the past four years, state spending rose $8 billion. Republicans argue that the state must overhaul state spending to ease the burden on taxpayers and businesses.

“It’s really hard to imagine people who are having difficulty meeting payroll in their small businesses, and yet our state employees have one of the richest health care plans that’s out there,” said state Rep. Barbara Bailey, R-Oak Harbor. “I find that just amazing.”

House budget writers said Tuesday they tried to preserve basic education and the state’s social safety net, as well as state-subsidized health insurance for kids.

Tax proposal likely

Taxpayers are likely to be asked for a tax increase to help avoid some of the cuts, said state Rep. Kelli Linville, D-Bellingham. But what tax and how much have yet to be worked out.

Wherever possible, Haigh said, lawmakers want to set a budget amount and let school districts, state agencies and colleges figure out the best way to meet it. Many wanted that flexibility, lawmakers said.

“There was trickle-down economics,” said Haigh. “Well, this is trickle-down pain.”

The House plan includes no tax increases, although hunting and fishing licenses would cost more. Vehicle owners would also be asked to pay $5 more in annual licensing fees, with the voluntary payment supporting state parks.

Here are some of the details from the House budget proposal:

Education

•Teachers would get no cost-of-living increases for the next two years, saving $357 million.

•Teachers would lose two learning improvement days, saving $72 million. This is like a 1 percent salary cut for teachers.

•A $4-per-student allocation to buy library materials would be eliminated. Savings: $8 million.

•$768 million would be cut from the Student Achievement Program, although about a third of that would be replaced by federal dollars.

Higher education

•The state would provide $34 million more in financial aid.

•Tuition increases would raise $231 million.

Social services

•Adult day health, which provides meals and daytime programs for the elderly and disabled, would be eliminated. The state would save $21 million.

•The state’s juvenile boot camp in Connell would be closed.

Mental health

•Regional Support Networks would lose $23 million, as well as millions more in increases they’d expected.

Health care

•Rates paid by the state to hospitals and doctors who see state patients would be reduced by millions of dollars.

•Health coverage for people judged unemployable would be reduced. So would coverage for people incapacitated by drug or alcohol addiction.

•Care by in-home health aides would be reduced.

•Nursing homes would lose $101 million in state and federal dollars.

•An HIV early-prevention program would be cut slightly, saving $1 million.

•State spending on free cancer screenings for low-income senior citizens would be eliminated, saving $4 million.

•The state would stop providing most vaccines to doctors for free, saving $54 million.

•Local health districts would get less state money, saving $20 million.

•State funding for the poison control center would be cut in half, saving $2 million.

•The Basic Health Plan, which provides state-subsidized coverage for the working poor, would be cut by 43 percent, saving $252 million.

Other

•Seven of the state’s 88 fish hatcheries, including one in Colville, would be closed, saving $8 million.

•State pension contributions would be reduced by $430 million.