DALLAS - With lawmakers refusing to send her their newly approved budget, Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer yesterday held her own hearing to deal with conflicts between her plan and the Legislature's.
Republican legislative leaders declined to send the GOP governor their spending bills, even though they were approved on Monday. Facing the certainty of a veto, lawmakers said they needed more time to work out their differences.
Brewer has said that provisions of the Legislature's budget could cost the state $900 million in stimulus funds for K-12 and higher education. Another $700 million for the Arizona Health Care Cost Containment System could be in jeopardy, officials said.
The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act that authorized the federal stimulus funds forbids states from dropping their higher education spending below 2006 levels. State university officials say that will, in fact, happen under the budget bills already passed.
Another provision that requires needy patients to prove citizenship before receiving health care could violate ARRA provisions, some health officials said.
Under the rules, lawmakers cannot change the bills they have already passed. So there may be no point to the delay unless the governor feels pressure to not veto the bills given the rapidly approaching budget deadline. The state constitution requires that the bills go directly to Brewer, but does not specify when.
With less than three weeks left in the current fiscal year, the state must have a budget in place by the beginning of the 2010 fiscal year July 1. In its latest version, the $8.2 billion plan passed by the Legislature is about $1 billion less than the current budget.
After deep cuts in the 2009 budget and short-term borrowing, Arizona faced a 2010 shortfall of $3.1 billion, according to some estimates. Brewer put the deficit at $4 billion.
At Brewer's hearing at the capitol yesterday, witnesses discussed the budget's impact on education, health and human services, local governments, transportation and public safety.
The League of Arizona Cities and Towns has supported Brewer's budget over the Legislature's, saying local governments would not have to adjust their own budgets due to lost revenue.
Brewer wants a three-year increase in the sales tax that she says would raise more than $1 billion, compensating for the rapidly falling revenues. Arizona is heavily dependent on sales-tax revenues. But Republican lawmakers say a sales tax hike could further impede economic growth.
While praising the Legislature's efforts to cut spending, Brewer told lawmakers in a letter last week that the urgency of completing the budget is heightened by the fact that the shortfall for fiscal 2010 represents 40% of the fiscal 2009 budget.
"Arizona's growing fiscal crisis stands to inflict a devastating impact on our state," she wrote in the letter outlining her own plan. "We have a non-negotiable duty to adopt a budget that simultaneously addresses, first, our current fiscal situation; second, our future fiscal situation, based on realistic projections; third, the immediate needs of our least fortunate adults and children during this grave economic time; and, finally, our stewardship role on behalf of future generations of Arizonans."
