Republican Leaders Call for State Budget Transparency
Despite a string of lawmaker convictions which exposed one of the worst kept secrets in Raleigh - the lack of transparency in state government - North Carolina still lags behind other states which are climbing aboard a national movement to provide taxpayers with greater access to information about state governments and their budget-making processes.
On May 27, 2008, House Republican Leader Paul "Skip" Stam and Senate Republican Leader Phil Berger proposed a solution to the current, behind-closed-doors exclusionary process by which
There is ample precedent for such a proposal. In 2006, Congress passed the Federal Funding Accountability & Transparency Act (FFATA), resulting in a searchable website which tracks federal contracts and grants. A number of state legislatures across the country have since adopted or are debating "Taxpayer Transparency Acts" or similar proposals which are designed to make state spending more readily available and understandable for citizens.
Rep. Stam explained how the budget is crafted in the North Carolina House of Representatives. "The House has eight co-chairs of Appropriations, all Democrats," he said, noting that while the appropriations subcommittees are proportional in membership, all eight primary co-chairs can also vote in each subcommittee, making them grossly disproportional. "In effect," he said, "they make all the major decisions for each subcommittee." The result is a tragically skewed full Appropriations Committee, which votes on decisions made by only a select few.
"The worst feature of the present rules is [that] these [appropriations co-chairs] dictate the allocation for departments, which then allows the eight budget chairs to rule any attempt to move money between departments, 'out of order,' noted Stam. "While dozens of amendments will be considered in the Appropriations Committee, not one can change the decree of the Appropriations chairs as to the basic structure of the budget," he added.
The system is a result of Legislative Rule 43(b), which was passed by the legislature under the guidance of its leadership during the 2007 session (HR 423, initially adopted on March 9, 2007 and amended by HR 2051 on May 14, 2007).
Senate Appropriations Committees work similarly, with the vast majority of the most important decisions in the state being limited to the judgment of those chairs selected by the leadership. "It is unacceptable for decisions about spending taxpayer dollars to be made in this manner," said Sen. Berger. He noted that the appropriations committee members act upon recommendations from state agencies, even while many of those agencies are the subject of allegations concerning the misuse of taxpayer funds. "The Department of Transportation and Mental Health have had major problems this year," Berger pointed out. "Will the budget really address these, or merely apply a band-aid?"
The budget process doesn't just leave Republicans out in the cold. Most rank-and-file Democrats are not included in negotiations either. In fact, the majority of lawmakers do not even receive a copy of the final budget - which can exceed 350 pages - until late on the day before the vote. Since the hours between the release of the final product and the actual floor vote are taken up with fast-paced committee meetings, few have time to even read the voluminous and detailed document, much less to digest it. And despite rules prohibiting the inclusion of any item that has not previously been debated in one or both chambers, appropriations committee chairs are famous for slipping in their own pet provisions at the last moment, whether they've been debated or not.
It gets worse. Floor debate is extremely limited with restrictions on amendments that make it impossible for lawmakers who were shut out of the budget process in the first place to make any changes that they feel necessary. Amendments are routinely shot down as "out of order" or "not germane" - rulings routinely used by chamber leaders when no other prohibition appears available to squash debate.
Copies of the final budget document (the "conference report") are not easily obtainable even to those who frequent the halls of the legislature, and the bill itself is rarely posted online prior to the floor votes - so taxpayers, who are actually footing the bill for each and every expenditure, have virtually no chance to review it and contact their lawmakers if they have concerns about provisions included in the budget - until after the spending plan has been adopted.
And even after the budget has been approved, it is virtually impossible for taxpayers - or even lawmakers - to accurately and independently track state spending. "During the course of the fiscal year, where the money goes and what it is used for is a mystery," Berger said. "Spending documentation is difficult to find and hard to understand."
Rep. Stam and Sen. Berger believe that the current system is unacceptable. "We call on the Governor and Legislative Services to open up state government and make all budget and fiscal information accessible to not just a few elected officials, but to every citizen in North Carolina who cares enough to ask," said Berger, recommending that the governor and executive agencies follow the lead of other states which are making all information easily accessible.
"It is time for a commitment to transparency in state government," Berger added. "If citizens don't know what government is doing, how can they decide if their investment is worth the cost?"
