Next week is "Budget Week" in the House of Representatives.
That means we'll spend 10, 12, maybe even
more, hours Monday through Friday,
maybe even Saturday, debating how this state should spend its
money.
And, even when we're done, the budget isn't
done. Remember January? The
Governor released his budget. Now the House has changed it into
a
different budget. And, next week we'll amend and change it even
more.
Then, the Senate devises a budget, debates it, amends it. Then,
a
conference committee will work out the differences, and send
the document
on to the Governor for his approval.
As the famous quote says, "It ain't
over 'til it's over." And this is just
the start.
If you start reading the budget you'll
find allocations of $71 million for
early childhood education, $103 million for maintenance of schools,
buildings, roads and bridges, $18 million for Westfield State
College, $20
million for the senior pharmacy program, another $20 million
for home
health care.
But wait, there are more than 300 single
spaced pages of line items,
department by department, agency by agency, down to the finest
detail, down
to the smallest amounts (among them, $27,000 for the doctor's
office in the
State House).
There's a lot of reading here. And you
have to dig deep to find the
funding for your favorite projects.
Believe me, every legislator, every citizen,
every state employee has a
favorite project. This past week was the week for calls and letters
and
visits from people representing every interest from Soldiers
Homes to brain
injuries, Boys and Girls Clubs to teachers, college presidents
to people
who ride Boston's subways (which we help pay for, by the way).
No one thinks they get enough. No one.
Read on, page after dizzying page. There's
an increase in education
spending, with an additional $471 million appropriated for early
childhood
programs like grants for full day kindergartens, literacy program
grants
for first grade teachers, a full $10-million for school nurses
and money
for school nutrition programs.
The education appropriations are almost
endless, with funding for regional
school transportation and state ward reimbursements, important
in my
district to the residents of Montgomery.
Holyoke Soldiers Home gets funding for
an expanded dental clinic and 15
additional beds for long term care. Plus a three percent increase
in its
general budget.
There's an increase in the budget for homeless
shelters, like our own
Samaritan Inn, but no shelters are earmarked, as they usually
are, so as I
write we're uncertain how the homeless shelter money will be
allocated as
the year begins July 1.
There's additional money for community
policing, which Westfield will
benefit from, raises for social service workers, more job training
and
daycare and employer supports for welfare recipients.
There's a so-called "outside section"
to create a trust fund for the
tobacco settlement moneys, which could total $7.6 billion over
the next 25
years.
Confirmation of the decrease in the state
income tax, from 5.9 percent to
5.7 percent, voted on last week.
All this and more. Much more. You can find
the entire budget on the
internet, if you want some weekend reading. Just go to
state.ma.us/legis/house/2000 budget and look.
There's even a dedication of the Fiscal
Year 2000 budget to the "good and
generous communities of Dana, Enfield, Green wich and Prescott,
now resting
under the Quabbin Reservoir." And, an official reminder
that long-term
prosperity requires sacrifices and a larger vision to benefit
all citizens
of our Commonwealth.
How we get to that vision is not easy.
We on the Ways and Means Committee had
hearings across the state, listening
to citizens and officials tell us what they needed and what they
wanted.
We receive federal mandates, which we have to fund. We're stuck
paying for
the Big Dig highway improvements in Boston. We have to maintain
promises
made in years past to continue funding for things like education
reform.
When it comes to the end result, the budget,
it is difficult, very
difficult,--no, it's impossible-- for 200 legislators to identify
common
goals.
So our state budget continues its progress
next week, with debate and
decisions. Deadline for amendments was two days ago, 4 p.m. Thursday,
so
it's too late to make additional suggestions now.
We can only look at those hundreds of amendments
filed by all of us, and
hope that programs important to our districts survive the process.