PHOENIX — Gov. Jan Brewer chided state lawmakers and future political foes Monday for talking a lot about balancing the budget but doing very little about it.
 Gov. Jan Brewer addresses lawmakers Monday, saying they need to act — and soon — to deal with the deficit. (Capitol Media Services photo by Howard Fischer) |
“That’s fine,’’ she said.
“But I have a straight-forward message for you: If you have a better plan, produce it,’’ Brewer continued. “And soon.’’
She even tried a bit of humor.
“Let me open these proceedings by offering you a deal,’’ she told lawmakers, cutting her plan back to just three, “a 40 percent cutback,’’ including new revenues, further spending cuts and future limits on the growth of government.
But Brewer’s comments were been aimed at more than legislators.
She said there are those who contend that, in proposing taxes, she has lost her way politically.
Those making the charges include four people who have expressed interest in running against her in the Republican primary: state Treasurer Dean Martin, Paradise Valley Mayor Vernon Parker, former Board of Regents President John Munger, and Buz Mills, owner of a gun training facility. All four have criticized her call for the temporary tax and insisted they could solve the state’s budget without additional revenues.
“There is no one here, and no one elsewhere, who has fought any longer or harder than I have for lower taxes, job growth and economic freedom for Arizona,’’ Brewer said.
“So spare us the profiles in courage,’’ she continued. “It’s time for a little less profile and a little more courage.’’
The state still has a $1.5 billion deficit for the current fiscal year even after prior spending cuts. The problem is that the recession has sent sales and income tax collections into a tailspin as people buy less and fewer people are employed.
And the gap between revenues and expenses for the coming budget year is in the $3.4 billion range.
Brewer said current revenues — about $6.3 billion — are about the same as what they were in 2004. But she it is unrealistic to roll back expenses to those levels.
“Since 2004, we have 140,000 new (public school) students, 11,000 new prisoners and 475,000 new Medicaid enrollees,’’ she said.
But the governor said even if lawmakers agree to send her proposal for a temporary sales tax to the ballot — and even if voters approve it in May — further spending cuts will be necessary. A one-cent hike in state sales taxes would bring in only about $1 billion a year.
Brewer noted that lawmakers last session, rather than refer the tax hike measure to the ballot, instead approved various plans to increase the cash flow. That includes both short- and long-term borrowing, including the sale-leaseback of $735 million of state buildings set for this week.
“We can no longer consider debt as a source of state revenue,’’ she said.
Brewer will not provide specifics of how she intends to address the budget until this coming Friday. That provoked criticism from legislative Democrats.
“The governor talked about courage several times,’’ said House Minority Whip Chad Campbell, D-Phoenix.
“It is time for courage,’’ he continued. “And yet we have not seen that from Gov. Brewer in her first year in office.’’
Attorney General Terry Goddard, the likely Democratic gubernatorial nominee, took his own shots, saying Brewer is not showing the leadership necessary to deal with the state’s financial mess.
“This was a talk that did not accept that we are in an emergency and did not provide a flight plan for how we’re going to deal with it,’’ he said.
But Goddard declined to provide his own alternative, saying that’s not his job as attorney general.
“The bottom line is we’ve got a leader in place whose job it is to provide the plan of how do we get this budget fixed,’’ he said.
Goddard said he will spell out his own ideas if and when he officially enters the race. And he sidestepped the question of whether he supports a temporary tax hike to get the state over the fiscal hump, saying “I’ll have more to say on that later.’’
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