Who wants $56 million?
That is how much Oregon’s 36 counties will be sharing if Governor Kulongoski signs Senate Bill 994, which passed in the closing days of the latest legislative session.
Much of the press about this appropriation, tucked in the last sections of the bill, has highlighted how the funds are an unexpected “gift” for counties that will be struggling once the fiscal year 2007 extension of the Secure Rural Schools and Community Self-Determination Act of 2000 expires.
But the distribution of the SB994 funds, and justification behind it, is likely to cause tension for many reasons – and it should.
First of all, the funds are characterized as being a way to help pad Oregon counties’ operating budgets in this time of crisis, but they are specifically targeted only at the maintenance of existing county roads. With many counties worried about how they will fund public safety, it is expected that budgets for roads would be slashed long before sheriffs, fire and medical services, which will themselves remain short.
Funding road maintenance will not enable counties to shift dollars they already won’t have, once the federal government cuts off support. And we were lucky to see the current extension of federal payments floated through on the Iraq and Afghanistan wars funding bill. We should not expect that again.
Second, the bill appropriates a minimum of $400,000 to each of Oregon’s 36 counties, including three that do not benefit from the federal timber-related dollars. Granted, timber counties will take the bulk of the funds – over half to just five counties – but including non-timber counties in a provision meant to aid timber counties undermines the principle underlying the move.
Third, the source of the dollars, which are to be drawn from the Oregon Department of Transportation, is likely to impact projects planned for state highways in various counties. Just because a county receives $400,000, or even a couple million, from ODOT, it does not mean that state roads within the county will receive maintenance. In fact unexpectedly shifting $56 million from the ODOT budget increases the likelihood that some counties will see maintenance or improvement projects canceled for the state roads within their borders.
Lastly, Oregon’s counties already receive about $350 million annually from ODOT. If counties are in danger of losing dollars used for essential public safety funding, it makes more sense to directly fund the safety budget rather than fund the roads budget and hope that the counties can then find what they need to fund sheriffs, health and fire departments from elsewhere.
The closing lines of the bill reads: “(this) 2007 Act being necessary for the immediate preservation of the public peace, health and safety, an emergency is declared to exist and this 2007 Act takes effect on its passage.” Yet no sections of the bill, which includes sections on funds transfers and judicial salary raises, directly address the public peace, health and safety emergency that Oregon’s counties are facing.
This is not a serious attempt to address the very real funding shortfall issue facing our counties which have been dependent first upon timber dollars and next upon federal dollars meant to replace the loss of federal timber sales.
A real long-term solution will address ways in which counties can rebuild their tax bases either by re-invigorating traditional industries or aggressively developing new ones- be it tourism, energy, or something else.
These are the bills our legislature needs to author and pass.
Once people get to know a little more about this sweet gift from the state, they will recognize that this appropriation has nothing to do with counties’ budget crises. Pushed through at the last minute and not directly addressing the issue that it claims to, this is pork if I ever saw it.
Normally appropriations like this are labeled at the outset as pork, but our legislature has salted and smoked this funding and packaged it as bacon.
It reminds me of a great friend of mine who swears that she doesn’t eat pork, of any kind – not for religious reasons, just out of disgust. Of course she’ll even try to deny pork consumption between bites of a bacon burger or bacon – wrapped scallop appetizers. “Bacon is not pork. It’s different,” she says, “pork is just filthy, but bacon is yummy.”
I wonder if our counties’ citizens will apply a similar rationale to this $56 million pork buffet. Will they critique it for its short-sightedness and failure to address the issue in a more meaningful way, or will they take it, spend it and deny that it is what it is?
I expect many will do the latter, because our legislature really does make it seem more like bacon, not pork.