The big legislative news this week is, of course, the passage of a budget from the House of Delegates along with a budget passed in the Senate. The two budgets will eventually, after posturing, become one final document. As the media has reported, the separate budgets are sharply different and reflect divergent philosophies of fiscal management and future potential. I have serious concerns about the $58.3 billion budget approved in the House because of what it does not provide for the present and what it ignores about the future. The actual numbers in the budget are questionable because they rely on contingencies, but even more, the overall inability to address on going fiscal responsibilities is shortsighted . . . at best. The House elected to raise additional funds by assessing Virginia corporations but those increases, at their most optimistic level, cannot cover some of the basic needs of the Commonwealth. To make up for the lack of revenue, the House budget:
•  includes no raises for teachers.
•  raids $270 million from the Transportation Trust Fund to cover General Fund expenses, leaving unmet road obligations.
•  cuts support for VRS (retirement) for teachers, requiring that local school systems pick up the reduction. In Montgomery County it means finding an extra $1.4 million. For Alleghany County, the figure approaches $400,000 and in Giles County, they will have to come up with an additional 223,000 to meet this unexpected and unfunded mandate.
•  strips money for state troopers and local sheriff's deputies—some of whom are now eligible for food stamps and their children are eligible for the free lunch program.
•  reduces funds for economic development by cutting programs like the Governor's Opportunity Fund, which provides funds for attracting and keeping business in the state.
•  freezes money earmarked for local governments—aid to police and town incentive programs.
•  eliminates research funding that will impact our universities, including Virginia Tech, and cuts funding for student aid.
•  reduces Medicaid money, which in turn means the state will lose federal matching funds.
•  cuts mental health and mental retardation funding.

The overall reductions in the budget are distressing, but I am particularly concerned with the shortsighted direction the House of Delegates is following. Not too many years ago, the House had primary responsibility for presenting a General Assembly budget. During the years when the state created a community college system (that now educates hundreds of thousands of Virginians and is the first line of defense for citizens facing downsizing and layoffs) and when the state forged a comprehensive transportation package (that addressed serious deficiencies in our ports, airports and highway system and opened up the Commonwealth to 21 st century commerce), the House of Delegates lead the way in creating programs that met immediate needs and built a strong, thriving advance toward the future. The current majority in the House is, in my view, looking through a narrow lens that restricts the vision ahead.

The state has traditionally shared responsibility with the localities for education costs, teacher salaries, local police departments and government administration, but during the last decade that support has evaporated to the point of placing serious fiscal burdens on local residents to pick up the diverted price tag. It is difficult to comprehend the logic of the House of Delegates refusing to consider a tax increase and then passing expenses that the state cannot or refuses to meet onto our local government, which, in order to have enough to cover their added fiscal responsibilities, will have to raise local taxes. I recognize the importance of giving the people of Virginia a budget based on sound judgment and realistic expectations. I think the House of Delegates' budget falls far short of that goal, and for that reason I joined 35 of my colleagues, over 1/3 of the body, to oppose the final version of the budget.

The $61.5 billion budget presented by the Senate is very different in approach and scope. It represents a realistic revenue source for education, roads, healthcare, employee salaries as well as mapping out a course that stabilizes future funding for the Commonwealth.

During the course of the final two weeks of this session, budget conferees appointed from the House and the Senate will scrutinize the chasm between the two chambers and tackle the work of compromise. A draft of the final budget will be presented to the full legislature toward mid-March and I look forward to evaluating their proposal.