More Fun Budget Provisos: Consolidating Natural Resource Agencies

Another proviso in the budget bill that will be of interest to our members is Section 907, which reads as follows:

"The governor shall convene a work group consisting of representatives from the natural resource agencies. The work group shall consider the experience of other states and their organizational structures to identify consolidation opportunities to improve service delivery and reduce costs. The work group shall submit a comprehensive written recommendation to the governor and the office of financial management by September 1, 2009."

It's looking like we're going to have a pretty rough summer and fall, and like next year's legislative session could be every bit as bad as this year. -- Dennis

Final Budget Mandates Study Of All Institutions

Whenever a budget comes out, I always make it a point to skim through the text of the actual budget bill. The Legislature is adept a slipping provisos -- instructions to agencies -- in the budget that can have a profound affect on WFSE members, and this year is no exception.

The final budget compromise this year doesn't close any institutions immediately, but a proviso has been included that appears intended to have that same effect. In the section making appropriations to the Office of Financial Management [Sec. 130] the following subsection appears:

"(4) $500,000 of the general fund--state appropriation for fiscal year 2010 is provided solely for a study of the feasibility of closing state institutional facilities and a plan on eliminating beds in the state institutional facility inventory. The office of financial management shall contract with consultants with expertise related to the subject matters included in this study. The office of financial management and the consultants shall consult with the department of social and health services, the department of corrections, stakeholder groups that represent the people served in these institutions, labor organizations that represent employees who work in these institutions and other persons or entities with expertise in the areas being studied.
(a) For the purposes of this study, "state institutional facilities" means facilities operated by the department of corrections to house persons convicted of a criminal offense, Green Hill school and Maple Lane school operated by the department of social and health services juvenile rehabilitation administration, and residential habilitation centers operated by the department of social and health services.
(b) In conducting this study, the consultants shall consider the following factors as appropriate:
(i) The availability of alternate facilities including alternatives and opportunities for consolidation with other facilities, impacts on those alternate facilities, and any related capital costs;
(ii) The cost of operating the facility, including the cost of providing services and the cost of maintaining or improving the physical plant of the facility;
(iii) The geographic factors associated with the facility, including the impact of the facility on the local economy and the economic impact of its closure, and alternative uses for a facility recommended for closure;
(iv) The costs associated with closing the facility, including the continuing costs following the closure of the facility;
(v) Number and type of staff and the impact on the facility staff including other employment opportunities if the facility is closed;
(vi) The savings that will accrue to the state from closure or consolidation of a facility and the impact any closure would have on funding the associated services; and
(vii) For the residential habilitation centers, the impact on clients in the facility being recommended for closure and their families, including ability to get alternate services and impact on being moved to another facility.
(c) The office of financial management shall submit a final report to the governor and the ways and means committees of the house of representatives and senate by November 1, 2009. The report shall provide a recommendation and a plan to eliminate 1,580 beds in the department of corrections facilities, 235 beds from juvenile rehabilitation facilities, and 250 funded beds in the residential habilitation centers through closure or consolidation of facilities. The report shall include an assessment of each facility studied, where and how the services should be provided, and any costs or savings associated with each recommendation. In considering the recommendations of the report, the governor and the legislature shall not consider closure of any state institutional facility unless the report recommended the facility for closure."

The hits just keep on coming! -- Dennis

Major Battles: Child Welfare Services

The Senate continues to push hard for the privatization of child welfare services on a massive scale. ESSB 5943 as passed by the Senate (and 2SHB 2106 as amended by the Senate Human Services & Corrections Committee), represents the broadest contracting out proposal to receive serious consideration by the Legislature in more than a decade. Adding insult to injury, the Senate continues to wage a direct attack on state employee collective bargaining rights in the language of the bill. We agree change is needed at CWS, but the Senate proposal is risky, expensive, and continues to demonstrate contempt for the state employees who work so hard to protect our children.

On the other hand, the House is on a far more responsible path for reforming CWS. As adopted by the House, 2SHB 2106 would create a pilot program to find out if an evidence-based contracting scheme would even work.

ESSB 5943 passed the Senate, but the House Early Learning & Children's Services Committee stripped the Senate language from the bill and replaced it with a modified version of their pilot program proposal. At roughly the same time, the Senate Human Services & Corrections Committee replaced the contents of 2SHB 2106 with a modified version of their privatization proposal. So, for those keeping score at home, now 2106 is the awful bill, and 5943 isn't so bad. -- Dennis

Major Battles: Community Corrections

Both budgets make significant cuts to community supervision, but the House budget cuts are much deeper and will result in a decimation of our entire transitional system. Not only is community supervision more cost-effective than incarceration, it provides offenders with the support structure necessary to change their behavior once they are released from prison. These cuts will result in higher crime rates and the House budget in particular represents a tremendous risk to public safety. -- Dennis

Major Battles: Institutions

The Senate proposal to close Yakima Valley School would result in traumatic disruption to 90 of the most vulnerable people in our society, eliminate respite services for over 100 families a year, eliminate hundreds of jobs and millions of dollars in economic activity – all to save (optimistically) $2.5 million over the biennium. The proposed closure of YVS doesn’t appear to be motivated by cost savings. The Senate budget makes a bad situation worse with the inclusion of a proviso requiring DSHS to immediately prepare a plan to close the Francis Haddon Morgan Center [PSSB 5600 Sec. 205(2)(f)].

Both budgets would close a JRA institution even though studies have shown the evidence-based continuum of services provided by JRA to be very effective. The Senate proposes closing Green Hill School, which would completely dismantle the JRA institutional system -- and is unjustifiable on a cost-benefit basis. The House proposes combining the closure of Naselle Youth Camp with dramatic cuts in JRA’s enhanced parole services, which would cause permanent harm to our state’s transitional services for juvenile offenders. -- Dennis

Major Battles: State Employee Health Care Benefits

There are 17 days left in the Legislative session and the pressure is building daily. The House and Senate are both expected to be on the floor, in either session or caucus, all day every day (and often into the night) until they adjourn (or not) on April 26th. Legislators will take two days off for Easter weekend and then work straight through to the end.

A lot of issues are resolved, for better or worse, and now we're down to focusing all of our lobbying efforts on a handful of issues that are still up in the air. For state employees, the single biggest issue is health care.

State employees have already sacrificed our COLA, we’re losing thousands of jobs, and our pension funds are being raided. Health care is the only meaningful benefit remaining for state workers. Neither budget fully funds employee health care, but the Senate budget cuts much deeper and will result in significant erosion in benefits.

What's happening is that other interests are arguing that health care dollars should be taken away from state employees and be used to fund their favorite program instead. Many Legislators forget that you can't have programs without people, and so a battle ensues. Protecting health care benefits is our highest priority right now, and we need all the support we can get.

The Senate continues its assault on state employee benefits in the surprising striking amendment to SB 5869 adopted in the Ways & Means Committee eliminating the “substantially equivalent” language pertaining to state employee benefits in current law. The underlying bill was carefully negotiated between WFSE and the Administration, and we testified in support in committee. However, with the Senate amendment we are now opposed. -- Dennis

Schoolhouse Rock: How a Bill Becomes a Law

This posting is for my boss who never thought I’d read our blog, let alone post to it.

DW

TVW Covers Impact Of Budget Crisis On State Employees

This week's edition of The Impact, one of TVW's weekly news programs, covers in some detail the impact of the budget crisis on state employees. The program starts with an interview with WFSE Executive Director Greg Devereux, and then features an insightful discussion with Rep. Sam Hunt (D-Olympia) and Rep. Bruce Dammeier (R-Puyallup). The total segment relating to state employees is about 15 minutes long.



The rest of the program delves into park closures and community supervision of offenders, which will also be of interest to many. -- Dennis

This Post Is For You, Joe

Ever since the link to the WFSE Political Blog was removed from the WFSE main page (against my wishes) I figured our readership would drop from four to zero. However, I have since learned that Joe still checks the blog regularly and he's disappointed that I'm not adding any new content. Buoyed by the notion that I actually have one reader, I'll try to go ahead and post something once in a while.

This has been an absolutely brutal week, culminated by the Senate's disastrous decision to pass the bill that would privatize all child welfare services on a 33-15 vote at about 8:00 pm last night. Feeling bruised and battered, I'm looking for a little levity. Fortunately, I found it in Schenectady, NY.

It appears Steve Raucci, Facilities Supervisor for the Schenectady City School District (and the local CSEA president), is accused of arson. According to the Times Union (Albany, NY), "It took Steven C. Raucci a long time, a prosecutor said Monday, but he did get even with a driver he suspected of scratching his car in a mall parking lot. Raucci remembered that a yellow Ford Mustang with vanity license plates had been parked next to him that day at the Rotterdam Square Mall, Schenectady County District Attorney Robert Carney said. About a year later, Carney said Raucci saw the car again and tracked down where the owner lived and worked. Then, the DA said, Raucci placed two explosive devices on the car's windshield and blew them up."

But wait! It gets better.

As part of the court records, a letter Raucci wrote to a new female employee was released, outlining "additional conditions" for her job (typos included):

> Be sure your supervisor is always happy
> Take time everyday to keep your appearance pleasing for your supervisor
> Be attentive to your supervisors needs and wants during the work day
> Always keep your hair at its present length or as closely as possible
> Talk to your supervisor as often as needed for him to feel comfortable
> Always remember that your supervisor is a man first and a supervisor second and he should be treated as such in that sequence
> Being attractive, sensitive and classy with a touch of sexiness, are crucial to the position
> If you are married or living with a significant other, it must be understood that during the hours of 7am-3:30pm you are there for your supervisor.
> Always express your feelings on anything that does not set well with you both in the office and out
> Your health, physical condition must always be your top priorities
> NEVER forget that you were chosen because you met all the above criteria's.

I don't know if Raucci really is an arsonist, but he's obviously an idiot. Nonetheless, I'm grateful to him for brightening up my week. -- Dennis

Budget Crisis Update

Sen. Mary Margaret Haugen (D-10) sends out a regular e-newsletter and the edition I received yesterday has an outstanding description of the state budget crisis. Here is the text of her article, in its entirety:

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"STATE BUDGET NEWS

The Legislature has been concerned about the growing shortfall in state revenues for quite some time, which is why we requested that the Department of Revenue prepare a revenue forecast to be delivered ahead of the normal date in mid-March.

Last week they told us that their projections indicate that Washington’s revenue shortfall is the largest in modern state history, both in terms of total dollars ($8.3 billion) and in percentage of the overall budget (nearly a quarter of the state budget).

This puts our state in worse fiscal shape than when the initial all-cuts budget was proposed by the Governor in November, and we’re not alone — the recession has wreaked havoc on 46 state budgets all across the country to the tune over $350 billion over the next two-year cycle.

The global economic meltdown has made lawmakers’ task for writing a budget harder, and there are no easy solutions. Although a federal economic recovery bill was signed by President Obama this week, it is not a bailout — the vast majority of those funds are dedicated to specific programs and projects that will help create jobs. This funding will not be able to fill the gap in state revenues that are the result of a national recession that began more than a year ago.

We are in the midst of an economic crisis that hasn’t been seen since the Great Depression, but we can’t let that become an excuse for sacrificing things like education for our children, access to health care, and protections for those who can’t take care of themselves.

The Legislature has already sent a first round of budget cuts to the Governor — the earliest in state history that’s ever been done — as an indication of just how urgent this situation is, but we’ve got more to do.

Unfortunately, using a “cuts only” approach to close the gap between state revenues and state spending isn’t as easy as it may sound. We wouldn’t be able to save enough through cuts even if we eliminated our entire state’s correctional system, our entire higher education system, all care for our seniors, and all care for those with developmental disabilities!

We also need to recognize that spending reductions alone can actually harm our economy.

Economics professor Dick Startz of the University of Washington estimates that every $1 billion reduction in annual state government spending during the recession will cost Washington about 15,000 public and private sector jobs.

Balancing the desire to fund worthy programs against our limited fiscal resources is a challenging task that will require everyone — Democrats and Republicans, advocates and citizens, all levels of government — to help find solutions.

This is a difficult challenge for all of us, and we will rise to meet this challenge as one community.

BUDGET MYTHS AND FACTS

The budget is a complicated issue that takes far more time than is appropriate in a single issue of E-news, so I’ll be providing some detailed information each week on state revenue and expenditures, the budget process, and what the Legislature is doing to help ease the impact of the nationwide recession.

This week, I’d like to address some budget myths that my staff and I have heard:

Budget myth # 1: The Governor and the Legislature are to blame for Washington’s budget shortfall.

Budget reality: The Governor and the Legislature have doubled the state average of total annual reserves in each of the last three years. 46 states currently face budget shortfalls, totaling $350 billion over the next two years.

Budget myth #2: Washington’s budget shortfall is the result of overspending.

Budget reality: State spending as a share of personal income has been declining for over a decade.



Budget myth #3: State spending in 2005 is the appropriate level for state spending today.

Budget reality: With an increase in population, inflation, service costs – and despite disappearing federal dollars — Washington has made record investments in education, health care, public safety and the environment over with past four years. But no one believes our kids are too educated, our families are too healthy, our communities are too safe, or our air and water are too clean.

Budget myth #4: We can simply cut waste and inefficiency in government and do more with less.

Budget reality: Washington ranks as the best-managed state in the nation, according to the Pew Center on the States in 2008. In 2003-05, the last time we used a cuts-only approach to address a serious shortfall, the state cut health care for 20,000 people, eliminated dental care for low-income adults, and froze funding for better teachers and smaller classrooms. We face similar choices now. A cuts-only budget means we do less with less.

Budget myth #5: Cutting human services creates costs savings.

Budget reality: Cutting needed human services such as health care and mental health treatment doesn’t eliminate the need. In most cases, it exacerbates the need, and increases the costs — both financial and human — down the road.

Budget myth #6: The federal stimulus plan will bail out our state budget.

Budget reality: The federal stimulus funds will optimistically help with about a quarter of Washington’s budget shortfall."

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Sen. Haugen lays out the issues nicely. Of course, the real issue is how the Legislature will respond. Time will tell. -- Dennis

Welcome to the SEIU Member Resource Center

As someone who is a "true believer" when it comes to the labor movement, I found this SEIU video about their Member Resource Center to be fascinating. I'd love to hear what others think.



-- Dennis

Public Safety Cuts In the Governor's Budget

Public safety is an area that gets hit pretty hard in Governor Gregoire's proposed budget. According to the House Appropriations Committee staff, the Governor’s budget proposal cuts corrections and other criminal justice programs by $162 million (NGF-S).

DOC Community Corrections (parole) takes the single biggest hit: $77 million. A savings of $42 million is achieved by discontinuing all supervision of “lower risk” criminals after they are released from prison. Another $27 million is saved by reducing the length of supervision for all offenders (except sex offenders) to just 12 months regardless of their risk category.

DOC Institutions are cut by $45 million. These savings include releasing aged and infirm offenders from prison (where will they go?); reducing sentences for lower-level drug offenders; deporting all non-citizen drug and property offenders; and sending parole violators to home detention instead of back to prison.

Juvenile offender programs are cut by almost $24 million (DSHS/JRA). The biggest cut is the proposed closure of Naselle Youth Camp (the largest employer in distressed Pacific County), an institution with a current population of 96 juvenile offenders. NYC is a work camp, with an emphasis on job training and reintegration skills. The budget also proposes closing two JRA community transition facilities.

Most of the public safety cuts the Governor proposes are aimed at programs that are designed to integrate offenders back into society and to reduce recidivism. We are surely going to pay more tomorrow for the savings we might achieve today. Some more examples:

- The Governor saves almost $4 million by eliminating an offender re-entry pilot program in DOC.
- The Governor saves almost $9 million by reducing evidence-based programs in JRA.
- The Governor saves almost $18 million in reductions to alcohol and substance abuse programs, including treatment services for adult drug court offenders.

As any community corrections officer will tell you, these "savings" will be achieved at the expense of public safety. Our communities are going to be a little more dangerous than they are today if these cuts are allowed to stand. -- Dennis