We are closing in on the halfway point of this year’s legislative session and despite an unprecedented budget crisis, it looks like any other year. Committees are reviewing the governor’s budget proposal and moving slowly toward April deadlines to report their final recommendations to the full House and Senate.
More so than in previous years, the committee process may be a pointless task. With a two-year combined deficit projection reaching up to $10 billion, the choices are too difficult to be made by committee. As is usually the case, the final budget deal will be negotiated by the governor, her staff at the Office of Policy and Management and a few top lawmakers.
So far, the governor and legislative leaders have failed to seize on this crisis as a leadership opportunity. It seems obvious that Gov. M. Jodi Rell’s initial budget proposal was written to allow her to avoid offering tax increases as a way to balance the budget. Blogs and mainstream media outlets have delighted in citing quotes and videotape that seem to prove the governor and her budget experts knew the spending plan she presented in February was as at least $2 billion out of balance.
As remarkable as that is as a political gambit, Democrats have not handled themselves much better in response. Rather than rush into the burning budget to save the state, they have been happy to delay action by pressuring the governor to come up with a new plan.
A Legacy Moment
The year of 2009 is a legacy moment for Gov. Rell, House Speaker Chris Donovan and Senate President Don Williams. This is their blizzard, their Mianus River Bridge. They have an opportunity to face this moment in a manner that will forge a special place for each of them in Connecticut history, or they can continue on their current path — a path that will produce short-term solutions and lead to another budget crisis future leaders will be forced to deal with.
The first step is admitting that the normal rhythm of drafting a state budget will not do. During the budget crisis of 1991, Gov. Lowell Weicker often convened a group of lawmakers that became known as the “maximum leadership,” in his efforts to forge a deal with the votes necessary to pass.
Leadership Group
The group consisted of Weicker, often his lieutenant governor, the speaker, the senate president, the majority and minority leaders of both chambers of the legislature and the chairs and ranking members of the appropriations and finance (tax-writing) committees. Of all the important people who roam the halls of the Capitol, this is the group with the most power and the most knowledge of the state budget and how to make it work.
They must take two necessary steps. Leadership move No. 1: The governor, or someone, should convene this group immediately, regardless of where the budget stands in terms of the normal legislative process. Leadership move No. 2: The group should meet until it can forge a thoughtful budget solution with the votes to pass.
If the governor and legislators who make up the maximum leadership of 2009 can put the search for partisan advantage aside, for the good of the state, they might be able to come to agreement well before the end of the regular legislative session and build a foundation for long-term recovery. This would be a great achievement worthy of high praise, and it is possible if our political leadership starts working as a team rather than as competitors.
Someone has to take the first step, and the rest have to summon the courage to join in.
Dean Pagani is a former gubernatorial advisor. He is V.P. of Public Affairs for Cashman and Katz Integrated Communications in Glastonbury.
