Columnist Writes About Growing State Deficit And Leaders Continued Reliance On Cuts
The following appeared in Paul Heintz’s December 3 “Fair Game” Column in the Seven Days newspaper:
As grandma prepared the stuffing last Wednesday, [the State] was busy cooking up a heaping helping of bad fiscal news.
The day before Thanksgiving, Commissioner of Finance and Management Jim Reardon announced that the [State] would cut another $17 million from this year's budget. The move came just three months after legislative leaders signed off on another $31 million in mid-year cuts.
The latest round of rescissions wasn't unexpected. In the first four months of the fiscal year, General Fund revenues clocked in at nearly $12 million — or 2.7 percent — below expectations. Since early last month, [the State] had been hinting that more cuts were in the offing.
Precisely which programs will be targeted isn't yet clear. Agency and department heads have until [today] to submit their recommendations to Reardon's office.
But one thing is certain: Any turkeys pardoned this time around will be back in the oven come January. That's because the state is already expecting a $100 million gap in next year's budget — and, after a decade of tough choices, lawmakers are running out of options.
If the burgeoning debate over how to fill Vermont's perennial budget hole has you feeling a bit of déjà vu, you're not the only one.
"The conversation about the budget is always, 'Is it up? Is it down? We're spending too much. We're not spending enough,'" says Paul Cillo, president and executive director of the Montpelier-based Public Assets Institute. "There's just been this manage-to-the-money idea, where if you're focused on the money, you're not focused on outcomes. You're not focused on what you can accomplish."
Cillo, a former House majority leader, points to the trouble-plagued Vermont Department for Children and Families as an example. For years, the child welfare agency has been underfunded and understaffed, he says. After two young children under DCF supervision were allegedly killed by family members last February and April, the agency was criticized for being — you guessed it — underfunded and understaffed.
"We heard this language in the recession of 'doing more with less,'" Cillo says. "And then, when we find out that we're doing less with less, we're really surprised."
Two recent reports requested by the [State] make a similar point: that state government isn't adequately serving Vermont's most vulnerable.
After a lengthy review of the two child deaths, the Vermont Citizens Advisory Board issued a brutal report a week and a half ago criticizing the state for failing to protect children who were clearly suffering from abuse. The independent panel, appointed by the [State], included health care workers, child advocates, legislators and a former judge, among others.
"It is clear that all agencies within the child-protection system are carrying case-loads that are too high, which causes workers to triage, to burn out and leave, and to cut corners in an effort to do the best they can," the report found.
It blamed "legislative funding cuts in the past decade" for a decline in quality control at DCF, and said that the 18 new positions added last summer "will not fully address" its high-caseload ratio.
[The State] has indicated in recent weeks that [its] disinclined to raise taxes to fill the budget hole or fund new programs. And House Speaker Shap Smith (D-Morristown) agrees.
"My view is that we need to look first at where we can reduce the amount of spending and then, if at some point in time we think we cannot get there, then we can look at revenue," Smith says. "But that's not our first option."
The speaker adds, "I think we're going to have to ask the question: Are there things we've done in the past that we can no longer afford to do? I don't know the answer to that question."
The way [Vermont Legal Aid’s Chris] Curtis sees it, if lawmakers choose to cut services instead of raising revenue, "That's effectively a tax on the poor."
"I hope that in the discussions around the budget that everything's on the table," he says. "This state cannot afford to continue to fight budget deficits with one arm tied behind our back."
Click here to read the full article...
Times Argus Editorial Supports DCF Workers
Excerpt from December 4 editorial:
"Also, the Legislature will have to address the problem of staffing at DCF. Short staffing has led to overburdened caseworkers, who have trouble giving cases the attention they deserve. The adequate training of caseworkers is essential. They have one of the most challenging jobs in state government, charged with making life-changing decisions, to confront problems of physical abuse, drug abuse, sexual abuse, neglect and poverty. People lie to them; they have to see through the lies. They have to look out for the interests of children, which may, or may not, require the awful decision of taking a child away from his or her mother — awful for the child and the mother, even if it is in the interest of the child."
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