Posted on 11/12/2010 4:07:55 PM PST by CedarDave
New Mexico's budget crunch for the coming fiscal year could be $190 million worse than previously thought, and announcement of the bad news set off another fiery exchange between the outgoing administration of Gov. Bill Richardson and Gov.-elect Susana Martinez.
Richardson's finance secretary Dannette Burch said Thursday that Martinez and state lawmakers will face a $450 million revenue shortfall for the fiscal year, starting next July 1, just to maintain the state's current level of services.
That's a much higher number than the Legislative Finance Committee's earlier projected shortfall of $260 million.
There have already been spending cuts in Santa Fe and at colleges and public schools around the state because of recession-triggered state revenue declines.
After Burch disclosed the new shortfall estimate Thursday, Martinez accused the Richardson administration, which has less than two months left in office, of hiding budget information and playing "financial shell games."
"The revelation of a near half-billion dollar deficit is far worse than expected and confirms our suspicions that the Richardson/Denish administration has been hiding the ball all along with respect to the true budget deficit," Martinez said in a statement.
(Excerpt) Read more at abqjournal.com ...
"Thanks for the bill, Bill!"
As I said above, federal funds are going to disappear after June 30 and she needs to eliminate state funding, too. Right now the majority of operating funds come from taxpayer-approved sales taxes in the counties where it operates (Valencia, Bernalillo, Sandoval, and Santa Fe). Let the transportation district raise fares to make up the loss. Even if the auctions are a net loss, it would still be less expensive than continuing operations.
Even if the auctions are a net loss, it would still be less expensive than continuing operations.
All public transit systems require levies against non-users to operate. Most run on a ratio around 5 percent user funded.
The best thing she could do to help her budget is to dismantle public funded transportation.
Sell the damn railroad, salvage it out.
Sell the plane.
Deport the illegals.
Deport Richardson’s cronie appointees,
Pull all state salaries into line with local salaries.
There, that will solve most of it.
One of my liberal clients has a retirement home in the mountains north of Albuquerque. He was so excited and pleased because Richardson was going to spend millions of dollars of federal money to upgrade the bathrooms at all the state and federal parks in the state. Now he’s moaning because the roads up to their house are in horrible condition and there is no money to fix them.
NM is a much smaller state than Texas. Texas needs to cut out some of the local functions taken over by the emipre. LOL
It will help Texas to have some protection in the Congress from Obama’s endless economic puhishment directed at the State’s industry. The Soros crowd doesn’t like Texas much.
The tax payers of Texas are looking at a 25 Billion Dollar budget shortfall, what dwarfs the New Mexico budget shortfall even on a per capita basis.
And while there are White House policies that hamper the economies of Texas and every other state, those policies do not account for the 25 Billion Dollar budget shortfall in Texas.
Instead, the shortfall is a result of out of control state spending which is the responsibility of the governor and state legislature.
what? are you kidding me? all this time i thought it was only we losers in California that had this problem... but Texas? a conservative state? the conservative state of Texas? and i keep getting freep messages telling me to leave Cali for Texas! i'm shocked! shocked, i tell you!
;-) /s
Both Texas and California have budget shortfalls of around 25 billion dollars with California having 13,000,000 more people than Texas.
Therefore, Texas residents are much deeper in state debt than even the people of California.
Texas has a deficit of “as much as” 18 billion; not 25 billion. http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704513104575256734081528528.html
We have a rainy day fund of over 8 billion. http://sunshinereview.org/index.php/Texas_state_budget
So, please, we are bad enough without exaggeration. Don’t make it worse than it is. Ten billion (on the maximum side) is freaky for Texas. We are no where near California’s 25 billion short. Also we are not socialists - the budget and scope of government will be cut as needed.
Look at my post above. Texas is at the most $10 billion short - not 25 billion as claimed. No, Texas is not a bunch of dysfunctional communists, foreigners and homosexuals like Calinfornia. They will cut the State’s scope of work to match their income.
As I demonstrated, your numbers about Texas are dead wrong.
well that's not what Trumandogz says... and at least Califoria doesn't claim to be a conservative state... but how is it that THEE conservative state of Texas is so far in debt? how can that be? it's the most conservative state that's ever been a state... it's a state that houses no liberals... no illegal immigrants... not even one homosexual... and yet?
i supposed i ought include /s...
I gave links. Trumandoz is seriously out of wack with reality. Perry says he is 5 billion over. The sources - liberal sources - say he’s more than that. We will see but we will handle it like we always do. Sorry, you Californians are in a class of your own. :)
Instead of reaching back six months to find a story about Texas’ 18 billion dollar shortfall, I will instead cite much more recent data on the Texas budget shortfall which projects the Texas budget shortfall to be 25 billion.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2622886/posts
I think I saw her down at The Bottle Shop last night.
The New York Times is your source? Straight out of Crazy Bill White’s campaign hysteria.
Actually the amount they are looking to cut in this actual budget cycle for the year is five billion. I asked a friend who is an State agency head. That is a lot! And it could be more if the elected officials don’t vote to use the rainy day fund. Either way, unlike California, they have to balance the budget in Texas and they will.
Is Texas handing out IOUs instead of real money? How do Texas’s tax rates compare to California’s? Are people and business’s fleeing Texas the way they are fleeing California? Just wondering..
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