In Search of Balance

Posted Thursday, January 8, 2015 1:47 pm

New year, same problem; that's an over-simplification of what faces Vermont's legislature when it convenes starting this week, but not by much.

The problem, of course, is money, or rather the lack of it. The state needs to fill a $17 million shortfall in its current budget plan, but that's small potatoes compared to the $100 million canyon that looms as lawmakers attempt to craft a state budget for the coming fiscal year which starts on July 1.

Every year, it seems, lawmakers return to Montpelier and face a daunting gap in projected revenues and expenditures, but $100 million is still a lot of money in a state where total spending for everything tops out at about $5.4 billion. Most of the low hanging fruit in terms of "easy" cuts and trims has long ago been plucked, and from here on it becomes an exercise in trade-offs that are guaranteed to be contentious and controversial.

Should the Department for Children and Families, for example, receive some additional funding to hire more personnel in hopes that tragedies like the cases involving two young Vermonters last year can be avoided? Or can the department be restructured to operate more efficiently while improving service? That such efficiencies exist is a mantra that many management consultants insist lies hidden under overly plump organization charts, and maybe there are times when that is so. Certainly in the private sector raw economics pushes that agenda relentlessly, but government and the public sector aren't for profit businesses, and serve a different role. While we'll hardly argue for more rather than fewer state public workers, there does come a point where social goods and services are not part of some imagined "free lunch." If we want better work out of the DCF, to take one example, we may have pay for it.

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The same goes for things like law enforcement, transportation and all the other things the state government does, or people think it should do, down to the level of whether or not the state should supply the Veterans Home in Bennington with more funding as it restructures, or spend more money to ensure state roads are well plowed during the snowy winter months. About the only area where there is some consensus that we have about as many people as we need would be in education, where the state with the lowest teacher-pupil ratio (that's us) probably does have some room to shed some personnel. Of course, this is one of those "third rail" political questions that gets hackles up backs and will require some real courage, as well as it being part of a broader overall comprehensive reform, to push through.

The other approach is to increase the amount of revenue the state takes in through taxes. That is about as anathematic as anything gets to most people, aside from those who assume that the top 1 percenters always can spare an extra $10 or 20 thousand. And they probably can, but many don't want to, or would rather donate to favorite charities of their own choosing, and they can go somewhere else and be part-time Vermonters and be taxed by another state. Increasing taxes of any kind in Vermont is going to be a tough sell, and it's one the Governor vowed to avoid too, until now. The latest tea leaf reading suggests, however, that the unthinkable has now arrived, even as property taxes are leaving many Vermonters gasping for oxygen, and the Governor may be forced, if reluctantly, to call for new or elevated rates of taxes on something.

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Let us suggest one area where this might make some sense.

Colorado and Washington state legalized marijuana sales last year, and while it's still premature to grasp all the consequences -- foreseen and otherwise -- one thing is pretty clear: there's a tidy amount of change to be dragged into state coffers from the stuff. Some estimates reckon that up to $12 million in new money could be pulled in from sales taxes and licenses from legalizing and regulating the sale of marijuana in the same manner we currently do with alcohol. Larger states like Colorado and Washington have harvested -- pardon the pun — far more.

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Granted, there are plenty of issues around legalizing the sale of marijuana. Number one is underage consumption. There's ample evidence to suggest that marijuana use impacts the development of the adolescent mind and brain cells more drastically than alcohol, and use by teenagers is not wise. That's why the age limit should be strictly enforced at 21, and some of the new revenues should be used to discourage and de-mythologize marijuana use by youngsters. Of course, legalizing it may accomplish the de-mythification as well.

If marijuana were as lethal and destructive as say, heroin, increasingly many Vermonter's drug-of-choice that they often enter through prescription painkiller medication, no amount of tax revenue could justify it as a tool to close a budget gap. Heroin is a death sentence, figuratively and literally. There is plenty of evidence to suggest that marijuana is not in that same class, or an inevitable "gateway" to harsher drugs like heroin.

Right now, marijuana is widely used around the state, and the governor was correct to support de-criminalization of possession of small amounts. Our overstretched police forces have more important things to do than haul an otherwise law-abiding citizen off to jail for possession of small amounts of marijuana. Those who want to indulge in it apparently can find ways to obtain it, and pay someone who doesn't work for the state's tax department to acquire it. Why could we not regulate it like alcohol, absorb the experiences of Colorado and Washington to see what went right and what didn't, adjust accordingly, and see that money flow into the state's treasury.

If the estimate of $12 or million is roughly accurate, then it won't be enough to solve a $100 puzzle, but it will be one step -- one of several state lawmakers will take on the road to a balanced budget for the next fiscal year.