Perry shows restraint -- on his own line-item vetoes of budget
June 20, 2009
Gov. Rick Perry, muting his usual criticism, generally praised lawmakers and signed into law a two-year, $182.3 billion budget late Friday after making barely a change.
Written by Robert T. Garrett, Dallas Morning News
Gov. Rick Perry, muting his usual criticism, generally praised lawmakers and signed into law a two-year, $182.3 billion budget late Friday after making barely a change.
The Republican governor took credit for slashing nearly $290 million of spending, but virtually all of the money wouldn't have been spent anyway because it was part of bills that died, such as a proposal to expand the Children's Health Insurance Program.
In a proclamation of his line-item vetoes, Perry repeated his usual calls for "truth in budgeting" and an end to lawmakers' habit of siphoning gasoline-tax revenues from the highway fund to help pay for state troopers and other nontransportation programs.
But he sprang no surprises, such as last session's erasure of health insurance money for community college employees or his repeated vetoes of money demanded by the federal government to offset costs of Medicare drug coverage for the elderly poor. In each instance, the state eventually made good on what lawmakers proposed to spend.
"The Legislature has done a commendable job," Perry said.
He used his veto pen to remove from the budget 28 "contingency riders" -- 25 of which would have paid for bills that died before the session ended June 1. Three others would have funded bills that Perry vetoed. While he didn't mention it, there would have been a net savings of some $12 million if all three had become law, the proclamation indicates.
Perry's light touch vindicated a prediction Sen. Steve Ogden, R-Bryan, made in here earlier in the week -- and delighted Waxahachie Republican Rep. Jim Pitts, Ogden's counterpart as the House's chief budget writer.
"It looks like he agreed with what we did, and I'm thrilled," Pitts said. "He didn't line-item anything, which is really unusual."
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