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Editorial: Overhaul legislators’ per diem structure
It almost always happens when the Washington Legislature goes into overtime – as it is doing this year. Public criticism focuses on lawmakers’ daily living allowance.
Unable to finish their work within the allotted 60 days of the regular session, legislators will reconvene on Monday for a special session called by the governor. Each member, therefore, will continue to collect the $90 per diem that is intended to cover housing, meals and other living expenses incurred by citizen legislators when encamped in Olympia on the public’s business. With 147 lawmakers, it adds up to more than $13,000 a day.
It’s a trifling amount compared with the $2.8 billion revenue gap that the House and Senate are still trying to fill, but it tends to rankle a lot of taxpayers who will foot the bill no matter how the fiscal problem is finally resolved.
But the per diem issue is part of a larger and legitimate issue over legislative compensation. The subject needs more attention than it gets.
Years ago, state Rep. Jim Kuehnle, a conservative Republican from the Spokane Valley, argued that the fixed per diem (a lot less than $90 in those days) should be replaced with a system in which lawmakers spent what they needed, turned in their receipts and were reimbursed, with all the details and amounts being made public.
Kuehnle’s plan made sense then, and it makes sense now, assuming a reasonable ceiling is part of the plan.
As it is, the per diem structure recognizes no difference between the Olympia or Tacoma senator who can go home each night and eat with his family and the Washtucna or Spokane representative who has to rent an apartment or motel room and eat at restaurants while the Legislature is in session.
The fact is, the financial burdens imposed by service in Olympia fall unevenly, depending on how far a lawmaker must travel from home. Eastern Washington lawmakers obviously incur a higher cost, making it harder to interest capable people to represent this part of the state in the House and Senate.
It’s time for the Legislature to fundamentally restructure the per diem process, basing it on fairness and common sense. In other words, determine a reasonable amount to cover daily living expenses while on the state’s business and allow individual legislators to make their own decisions within that limit – all of it open to full public inspection.
Who’s frugal? Who’s profligate? Let elected officials answer to their voters.