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FacebookJon Ralston notes, sadly, special session
Sun, Jun 29, 2008 (2:01 a.m.)
It didn’t take long. Not much unexpected happened. Nothing especially noteworthy occurred.
And yet the 12-hour special session Friday provided a microcosm of the state of political play in Nevada and a glimpse of a very depressing future. It also presages a 2009 session that could make the raw ugliness of the 2003 Legislature, which required two overtimes to enact a billion-dollar tax increase, look like a night out at the Reno Rodeo.
Nearly every legislative session is about the money — how the Gang of 63 will spend it and who will receive it — and usually features intermittently dramatic confrontations about matters large and small. But the 24th special session was about how not to spend money, with a preordained solution to a simple math problem — cutting $275 million from the budget.
There essentially were no arguments between Republicans and Democrats, who had negotiated a solution beforehand that wasn’t especially creative. The only sticking point — and it didn’t stick for long — was a clumsy Senate Democratic caucus attempt to save money for textbooks.
There was no need for this special session, which featured a reshuffling of money that could have been accomplished by Gov. Jim Gibbons and the Interim Finance Committee. This was a session born out of politics, driven by politics and cut short by politics. Never has a legislative session been about so little and yet done so much symbolic damage.
The session, despite its brevity, perfectly encapsulated the state’s political leadership:
An irrelevant governor who won’t even sign the budget fix because lawmakers encased it in a concurrent resolution that does not go to his desk, a man who took a dizzying number of positions on suspending state worker raises, who managed to alienate the one man who had tried to help him (Senate Majority Leader Bill Raggio) and a faux leader who is marching toward the 2009 session like a Pied Piper taking the state off a fiscal cliff.
An ambitious speaker, Barbara Buckley, who sounded more gubernatorial than Gibbons in her Thursday night rebuttal to the governor and who seemed genuinely torn between having to make short-term, painful cuts and wanting to look to the long term for a solution to the state’s harebrained tax system.
A cautious Senate majority leader, facing a challenge from the right in a primary election, who wanted to get in and get out, show he could still lead and who, as a prisoner and defender of tradition, could not contain his disgust with the governor and anger at the late-game partisanship by the Democrats in his house.
And a rookie Senate minority leader, Steven Horsford, whose ham-handed ambush late in the day to try to put education under the purview of a cost-cutting commission, among other maneuvers, showed he is not quite ready for prime time as prime time approaches next February.
What happened Friday was an overture to an extended piece — 120 days or more — that begins playing in February. The scenario is stark: State leaders have gutted the budget, taking $1.2 billion from a $7 billion biennial package. And with Gibbons now locked into promising what he calls a no-growth budget, with the economy still awful and with hundreds of millions in mandated spending for education and social services, that means massive cuts in 2009.
Unless.
Unless Buckley really does what she promised — find a long-term-solution. Unless Horsford can mature — and maybe pick up another vote in the election — and be a reliable ally for the speaker. Unless business and gaming leaders put the state’s health ahead of their bottom lines. And unless Gibbons either sees the light and illuminates a real vision or is pushed out of the way by a political and private sector elite who will never let this happen again.
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Why does Horsford have to kiss Buckley's rear? She will be gone soon, maybe even in a couple of weeks depending on the Supreme Court. He is the one that definitely will be around. If I was Buckley, I would be more concerned about getting along with Horsford and not insulting him. He could well play Obama to her Hillary Clinton.
Why does everything in politics these days have to be adversarial? It's not a matter of Horsford kissing Buckley's rear. It's a matter of the two party floor leaders having a good working relationship built on political savvy and good information. Jon's right-- the Democrats will be stronger as Horsford develops. It's not dissing him, but he's new and still learning.
She was not dignified in her speech. She was talking down to the citizens of the state.
She should not be in leadership.
Buckley's plan for 2009:
1) Stick hand deep into taxpayers' pockets
2) Grab a fist full of cash
3) Promptly give the cash to the unions
jfnance - Isn't it time you took your unbridled support for a failure of a governor and moved to Carson City so you can insert yourself into Gibbons posterior?
Everything you write here is so completely inept and one-sided. This governor is a liar and a failure - he has a 21% approval rating. Quit defending a loser when he lies - Oh wait you are probably a Bush Cheney apologist too. Nevermind - you can't handle the truth.
Judy, excellect insults....
They are even better than Buckley's.
Keep working on it. Right now you are at the 3rd grade level. One day you might reach 4th grade.
Stick with the insults. I doubt your logical points can do better.
LOL, Nance insulting anyone on their lack of "logical points?" Pot, meet kettle.
I am thrilled with the way Nevada School Districts get the bang for each buck as few as they are. At some point being last on every list when it come to education should be a bad thing. Why would a new business come to Nevada when we do not spend enough on educating their work force or/and their children. Investing in education is the first place to start. Ms. Buckley has it right.
while the fighting goes on regarding the budget has anyone noticed the UNLV rebels are touring australia? can't see the forest because of the trees? what missing in all this is any sign of common sense.
"LOL, Nance insulting anyone on their lack of "logical points?" Pot, meet kettle."
I guess that one could call this statement a catch-22.
"I am thrilled with the way Nevada School Districts get the bang for each buck as few as they are. At some point being last "
What?
Your workers got a 4% raise on top of the step raise. Over half of your workers will get anywhere from 6% to over 10% raises.
All this at the expense of the rest of the budget.
I shed a tear for you tonight.
I shed a tear for the other non-government workers that are getting laid-off, too. They are on ones really making do with little.
Nance you are way out of it.
The problem for Nevada is that our teachers ONLY get 96% of the national average for pay. That means that on average most states spend more on their teachers. Worse is that teachers are expected to pay for their own classroom supplies. If Nevada wants a better education, we need to pay our teachers more so we get more teachers. I almost became a teacher, but was stopped cold when I realized I would be working 50 hour weeks and only get paid about 30k a year. That is not a living wage for one of the toughest jobs out there, period. I also DARE you Nance to teach for at least a month a group of first graders. I would love to see how far you would get and if you wouldn't be asking for a raise at the end of it.
Our education system will get better when the curriculum is revamped, our teachers are paid more, and there are more of them out there.
If you want to be an ostrich and say that they should just take what they can get and you will be a scrooge and not give them a cent more, be ready for our children and our children's children to get dumber.
"The problem for Nevada is that our teachers ONLY get 96% of the national average for pay"
Nevada is ranked 25th in the nation for teacher paid.
http://www.census.gov/statab/ranks/rank2...
http://www.nea.org/edstats/RankFull06b.h...
The different between the average pay and 96% pay is around $1,900. The 4% COLA raise is equal to around $1,800 of the Nevada average teacher salary.
So next time you can whine and say...we only get paid 99.9% of the national average.
Yeah and in Nevada it still wouldn't be enough. Are you seriously that thick, that you would say schools don't deserve more money? Are you that blind that you wouldn't give our children, our future and not just Nevada's but the nation's, more of a fighting chance in today's increasingly competitive global market? Or would you rather have them slowly flag behind the pack for a few more petty dollars?
I would further ask if you are happy with failing test scores, out of date material, classrooms of 40 or higher, and less than great grad rates?
Also what is your problem. Conservatives have had free run of the country's executive for almost 8 years, the legislative only last year became democratic for the first time since during Bill Clinton, and the Supreme Court has almost always been conservative. Where's the problem?????
Didn't having all three branches of the government do it for the neocons????
I mean none of the parties by themselves are undoing much. They both make their advances, but one is not messing up the country over the other. If anything it's the fault of both Republicans and Democrats for not being able to come together more.
and fyi, this isn't whining. Whining is what people who've been in power for the past 8 years do when finally things don't go their way. And for the love of Peter quit calling Obama Hussein. It's a blatant scare tactic. I mean we only call W that to differentiate him from his father.
Money has nothing to do with.
40 years ago, children were getting a decent education at half the price.
Now, we have unions that just care about themselves and nothing else.
The unions held a gun to Buckley's and her Democrats friends political lives.
They said, "Touch the 4% COLA $31 a week after tax raise and your political life is dead."
The rest of the budget they will cut 10% to make up for that $31 a week after tax raise.
All we wanted to do was to delay it one year.
I am sure that the unions will demand that taxes go up by hundreds of millions in 2009 to pay for more goodies for the unions.
Jim, Jim, Jim, I've told you before, I'll tell you again. The majority of State employees will get 4%. Not 6%, not 10% it's 4%. Always has been, always will be.
Somebody else disagrees with you and they have access to the budget detail.
"....would allow most state workers, including teachers, to pocket pay raises of roughly 9 percent at a time..."
http://www.lvrj.com/opinion/19245799.htm...
Now there's the bastion of truth, the RJ editorial section!!! Which by the way, made no mention of having seen any budget detail at all.
Call the State's personnel department and ask them how many employees are topped out. And while you're at it, ask about the wonderful longevity pay program.
The complete quote starts "Coupled with the step increases" ... These step increases would have happened with or with out the cost of living 4%. So the RJ can exaggerage all it wants, but the 4% is only 4%.
The step raises are not raises.
I got it. It make perfect sense in the liberal union world.
I should go to my boss and tell him that I need a 8% step "raise" and it will not count as a raise.
I quoted a source. You guys have quoted no sources to support that less than 50% of state workers get step raises.
No, but we told you where to go to get real information.
Sometimes it seems like the anti-education crowd is deeply fearful that society as a whole is getting smarter than they are. Peasants always grouse and complain about the "uppities" in town.