What the heck is going on with the budget?

Funds are short partly because the Okie legislature is too reliant on oil and gas tax revenue.  This is not a new situation.  We Red Dirters who are old enough remember going through budget shortfalls in the 1980’s.  Politicians should have learned their lessons, but those folks have very short memories.  Oklahoma term limits of twelve years encourage legislative amnesia.  Politicians don’t care about the future because they won’t be in office when it all comes down.  Long term vision is not rewarded.

They should have seen it coming.  The state treasurer was warning them, but the governor’s financial genius never paid attention.  The projected downturn in funds was consistentantly underplayed or miscalculted.  Consequently, state agencies have to cut current year budgets again!

At the first cut in December, the governor’s finance secretary said the cuts were an “opportunity” for agencies to get creative and find ways to cut expenditures.  Today, another 4% cut was announced and the same genius said he thinks there are members of the legislature who don’t understand how serious this situation is.  Further, he said the situation calls for long-term solutions and can’t be fixed with short term budget “gimmicks.”  Really, Mr. Doerflingler?  It appears that YOU didn’t understand the situation back in December and expected agencies to use “gimmicks” to make the deficits go away.  Now, deep into the fiscal year, you finally understand it’s serious.

No, Mr. Doerflingler, you didn’t cause the budget failure, but you failed to recognize it while Treasurer Ken Miller was publically stating how bad it was.  But you’ve never paid any attention to anyone else, have you, Mr. Doerflingler?  Because you’re the smartest person in any room, right?  It was your job to project these deficits.  How else do you justify your $172,800 (plus benefits) salary?

During the governor’s “hiring freeze,” you gave you gave 400 of your employees raises.  Seventy-five of your employees got raises of over $10,000, while you tell agencies they have an “opportunity” to save money.  Now those agencies have only four months to make up a year’s worth of cuts to their budgets.  Thanks for nothing, Mr. Doerflingler.  You have failed at your job.