Zarelli hopes for special session
Tuesday, March 28, 2006 6:59 AM PST
By Don Jenkins
Printable version
E-mail this articleA judge's ruling that lawmakers last year broke the voter-approved state spending limit, voiding cigarette and liquor tax increases, creates the "right kind of mess" and could force lawmakers into a special session, a Republican legislator said Monday.
"I think (a special session) would be good. I like the fact that it would give attention to what was done," said Ridgefield Sen. Joe Zarelli, the top-ranking Republican on the Senate budget committee.
A Snohomish County judge this month ruled that lawmakers last year exceeded the Initiative 601 expenditure cap by $250 million and therefore should have referred the higher cigarette and liquor taxes to voters.
Attorney General's Office spokeswoman Janelle Guthrie said Monday the state hasn't decided whether it will appeal. State attorneys are waiting for a transcript of the March 17 oral ruling by Superior Court Judge James Allendoerfer.
Allendoerfer ruled the Democratic-controlled Legislature used budget transfers to circumvent spending limits. Lawmakers should have openly raised the spending limit in a separate bill or submitted the tax increases for voter approval.
Lawmakers raised cigarette taxes by 60 cents a pack, hard-liquor taxes by $1.33 per liter and applied the sales tax to warranties to raise about $260 million over two years.
Almost nine months after the taxes went into effect, the groups that brought the lawsuit aren't seeking refunds. But they want the state to quit collecting the taxes, which could create a budget gap for lawmakers to address.
The Department of Revenue will collect the taxes until it receives a written court order to stop, department spokesman Mike Gowrylow said.
Senate budget committee vice chairman Mark Doumit, D-Cathlamet, said he expects the state to appeal Allendoerfer's ruling and to win.
"There shouldn't be any need to go back for a special session," he said. "The bottom-line, I think, is the Legislature needs to maintain the ability to write budgets in a fashion that a majority (of lawmakers) feels needs to be done."
In a commentary posted on the Senate Republicans' Web site, Zarelli wrote that Democratic budget writers got busted for a budget sleight of hand he compared to "three-card monte." In the game, the player is challenged to guess the location of a card that, once shown, is placed faced down and shifted with two others.
Zarelli said in an interview Monday the court was "exactly correct" and said lawmakers need to be more open about raising the spending limit and then face the consequences.
"Nobody wants to go out on the campaign trail and say, 'Yeah, I voted to get rid of the spending limit, so we can spend all we want,' " Zarelli said. "But it needs to be done in a more open process."
Doumit said Democrats used budget maneuvers invented by GOP budget writers when Republicans were in the majority.
"601 has been changed so many times by both parties," he said. "I've never played three-card monte, so I don't know how you play it, but I don't feel we did anything to pull the wool over anyone's eyes."
This year, Democrats again raised the spending limit, but passed a separate bill amending I-601. Doumit said he hoped the judge will take that into consideration and revise his ruling. "I think we've already addressed the issue."
The Evergreen Freedom Foundation, National Federation of Independent Business, the Building Industry Association of Washington, the Washington Farm Bureau and the Washington State Grange filed the suit.
Evergreen budget analyst Jason Mercier said Allendoerfer's ruling highlighted the Legislature's "lack of transparency" in following the spending limit.
"The significance of this ruling is the Legislature can't have it both ways anymore; it must honor 601 or repeal it," he said. "Let's have a debate: Should we have a spending limit or not?"
Voters approved I-601 in 1993, capping the growth in the state budget to inflation and population growth.
Beginning next year, spending increases will be tied to the growth in personal income. Democrats, who sought the change, said the inflation-plus-population formula was an unrealistic measure of the demand on government services.
This year, lawmakers increased state spending by $627 million.
Zarelli said that a strict following of I-601 would have limited new spending to $180 million.
Democrats described their budget as "fiscally and morally" responsible because it increased support for health care, education and other important government services and still left $935 million in reserve funds.
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