FROM THE DESK OF REPRESENTATIVE DE BOEF

January 20, 2005

In my newsletter this week, I would like to elaborate a little bit more on the Governor’s State of the State speech and what came shortly after.  The bubble of optimism that I always feel when we first come in for the new session burst when I listened to the Governor’s annual address.  My definition of it would be “Socialism 101.”  Rather than charting a sensible, realistic course for Iowa’s future, he delivered a laundry list of new government programs and bigger spending.  Worse yet, he did so without any plan to pay for them either by cutting existing programs or raising taxes.  When I was growing up, my Dad called that “Putting the cart before the horse.” 

Vilsack’s laundry lists included state funding of daycare and pre-school, a reincarnation of the Iowa Values Fund, and increased spending on government-run health care programs.  He also talked about his plan to re-structure Iowa’s tax code which is supposedly “revenue neutral.”

While we can debate each of these proposals on its individual merits, we cannot continue to avoid discussing how to pay for more and more new programs while we already have a guaranteed 12% increase in state spending from the programs already in place. This becomes  more alarming when one considers the fact that state revenue is coming in (finally) with increases around 7%.

And while Vilsack’s “State of the State Address” made the top headline on every TV and radio station in the state, he submitted a bill to the Iowa House to spend an additional $213 million for the current fiscal year.

This bill, called a “supplemental appropriation”, takes $213 million from the remaining balance we expect to be the state’s bank account at the end of the 2005 fiscal year and spend it this year.  This is an outrage!  That makes a 17% increase in the size and cost of state government.  Imagine the reaction from your employer or your customers if you asked for a 17% increase!  Sending this supplemental appropriation bill to the Iowa Legislature in the very first week of the session compromises the spirit of bipartisanship that Vilsack promised.  Spending the entire budget surplus before the end of the fiscal year is not only a bad budgeting practice, it violates the rules of Generally Accepted Accounting Principles and violates the spirit of the 99 percent expenditure limitation law.  Under current law, the FY 05 ending balance will be used to refill the Cash Reserve Fund and begin to repay the Senior Living Trust Fund.  And it avoids the biggest question of our times.

How can state government provide the most basic services – public safety, education, and protection for the poor and vulnerable – without overburdening taxpayers and mortgaging the future of our children?  Quite simply – talking about new spending and new programs before cleaning house of the old is irresponsible and unreasonable.

I am a fiscal conservative, and have no intention of supporting this proposal for more spending, which can lead to nothing more than increased taxes on Iowans.  I have state repeatedly that Iowans are not under taxed!

We can’t keep putting the CART before the HORSE!

I would appreciate your input.  My phone number at the Capitol is 515-281-3221, or e-mail me at bdeboef@legis.state.ia.us.  I would welcome visitors at the Capitol, too!