If you want to know why Indiana’s in such bad budget straits, just visit any store during this Christmas shopping season.
The sales and discounts that usually start the day after Thanksgiving started just after Halloween and are going to run with a vengeance until Santa arrives. The deep discounts and sales and lowered prices where Hoosiers shop is one reason why state revenues are falling sharply behind projections in the first third of the state’s budget year.
This column, along with Democrats in the legislature, advocated that Governor Mitch Daniels and Republican legislators agree, in this fiscal crisis, to adopt a one-year budget that would be reopened after 12 months.
The Republicans and the governor were hardheaded, insisting on the tradition of adopting a two-year budget. Now that their soothsayers got their economic forecasts and predictions wrong, Indiana finds itself, despite a billion buck surplus, behind the eight ball.
State agencies have been told to cut their already lean budgets by 10 percent, with nothing sacred. That put layoffs of state employees on the table and last Friday, 33 state employees were the first to pay the price.
Gov. Daniels has been proud that Indiana had managed to avoid the layoffs that most state governments have endured during this Great Recession. Now, Indiana is immune no longer.
The 33 Department of Administration employees losing their jobs are the start of more layoffs in the weeks ahead. Despite signs of recovery, including an upwardly moving stock market, Indiana’s budget shortfalls are here to stay for the next several months.
The next impact will be on Hoosier schools that may not see their scheduled increase in state funding.
The situation of school funding along with community pride may have had something to do with last week’s overwhelming “yes” vote to increase property taxes for schools in the Hamilton Southeastern school district. What’s significant is that this is the first time, since the 2007 property tax revolt, that a predominantly Republican area voted in favor of increasing their taxes.
Even though education funding is in jeopardy and cuts in teachers and programs are coming, the word is that Hoosiers don’t care right now about education. According to what I’m hearing the economy and jobs are the big concern of Hoosier voters – this was disclosed in a poll of voters conducted by the Indiana Democratic Party.
As the legislature gets ready for the next session, lawmakers are talking about issues (ethics and redistricting) that most Hoosier voters don’t give a damn about. These issues, while important, won’t put Hoosiers back to work or increase Hoosiers’ income. More critically, these sidebar issues won’t help turn this state’s economy around, which would help improve state revenues.
The mantra of our legislature this upcoming session should be the oft-quoted words of James Carville, “It’s the economy, stupid,” not sideshow issues.
What I’m Hearing
in the Streets
Could Mayor Greg Ballard be seriously considering hiring an individual from a small East Coast town to be the next Public Safety Director of Indianapolis/Marion County?
There’s a buzz that one of the four finalists for the job, to be announced this coming week, might be the embattled Public Safety Director of a town one-seventeenth the size of Indianapolis (52,912, according to Census ACS estimates versus Indianapolis’ 876,178). An area smaller than seven of Indianapolis’ nine townships.
Running police, fire and emergency management in a community of some 53,000 is far different than running the same institutions in a major city of some 900,000.
The last time someone from a smallish community was hired to run a major Indianapolis institution was when the Indianapolis/Marion County Public Library system picked Linda Mielke from a small Baltimore suburb several years ago. And you remember what a disaster that was!
I’m sure this out of town candidate has good qualities, but they’re not ready to move from a Class A sized public safety arena to the major leagues.
The outsized importance of sports at big name colleges and big name high schools overshadows the importance that sports does play in developing character and skills among young people; along with that positive intangible called “school spirit.”
Decades ago, Indianapolis Public School (IPS) football teams were powerhouses; as were their basketball and other sports teams. But the sharp decline in IPS enrollment has dramatically and negatively impacted IPS’ sports programs. Especially football.
Last week’s announcement that three IPS high schools, John Marshall, Washington and Manual would be dropping football is a decision that’s pennywise and pound-foolish.
IPS took a stand years ago that its student athletes had to meet a C-average standard to play. A tough stand, but a correct stand. At those three high schools, though, the stand didn’t help as the teams were depleted.
But it seems unfair to these student athletes that they must transfer to a new school in order to participate in athletics.
Last month, I saw Manual’s football team in action. An undermanned squad of just 17 facing a team four times larger. Though the odds were against them from the kickoff, despite the score mounting, Manual’s team played as if they were a team three times their size.
At the game I attended, despite tough odds, these young men from Manual gave it their all for the full 60 minutes. Driving for a touchdown literally until the final gun. They earned the respect of their opponents and their opponents’ supporters. They did their school and IPS proud! They’ve earned the right to continue as a team, not be broken up and distributed to other schools.
IPS recently spent $500,000 buying new electronic signs. They should’ve spent that money reinforcing football and other sports at IPS high schools!
Two of Indy’s three Black formatted radio stations took top honors in the 22nd annual Indiana Broadcasters Association Spectrum Awards.
WHHH – FM (96.3) won a Spectrum Award as Indiana Radio Station of the Year and the station’s afternoon DJ Jay Rio was named Indiana Radio Air Personality of the Year.
WTLC-AM 1310’s “Afternoons with Amos” received a Spectrum Award for Outstanding Special Interest Program. The weekday talk show received the statewide honor for its August Town Hall Meeting on Health Care Reform, which featured listener questions on health care reform with guests Congressman Andre Carson and Christina Romer, chair of the President’s Council of Economic Advisors among others.
See ‘ya next week!
