OLYMPIA — Gov. Chris Gregoire, challenged for re-election by a conservative former Senate budget writer, on Tuesday proposed a $144 million supplemental state budget that leaves most of the state’s $1.4 billion surplus salted away for a rainy day.
Dino Rossi, who lost to Gregoire by 133 votes in 2004, and minority Republicans have castigated the governor and Democrats in the Legislature for overspending. But Gregoire said her new budget reflects “thoughtful choices and fiscal discipline.”
The Democratic governor, proposing her last budget before facing the voters next November, is asking the Legislature to approve more spending for flood relief, small pay raises for teachers and nursing home workers, litigation, and a variety of small increases for health care, community safety, campus safety and other programs.
But Gregoire says the overriding emphasis is on saving most of the state’s reserves, about $1.2 billion in all.
This includes $430 million that will go into a hard-to-tap “rainy day” fund that voters created last month, and $774 million that lawmakers would leave unspent.
“The goal of this supplemental budget is to invest money to address immediate concerns that cannot wait until the next biennium, and to save the rest of the revenue surplus,” the governor said in prepared remarks.
The new spending would go atop the existing $33 billion two-year budget.
Rossi and the Republicans say the Democrats already have spent so heavily they’ll cause a deficit in a few years. Gregoire and the Democrats defend spending for schools, health care and other party priorities and say a sizable reserve should guard against future spending cuts or tax hikes.
Gregoire said $99 million of the new spending is unavoidable and includes a teachers’ pay boost mandated by citizen initiative, money for litigation, and over $540,000 for calling up the National Guard for flood duty.
The governor has spent the last week rolling out proposals that cost a net of $45 million. These deal with monitoring of sex offenders in the community, enhanced college campus safety, health care and patient safety and other programs.
Her new transportation budget takes $100 million from other projects to pay for three new small ferries. She also requests $6 million to start building a concrete barrier along northbound Interstate 5 in the Marysville area.
The governor’s operating budget assumes $221 million in savings, including over $100 million from lower health care costs, $8 million from lower-than-expected school enrollment, and caseload and cost savings of $78 million at the Department of social and Health Services.
The disaster aid section of the budget includes $15 million as state matching money for federal relief efforts, $50 million in bonds for a flood-control project in the Centralia-Chehalis area, $10 million in bonds for housing in flood-ravaged counties, $6 million for small business assistance, and $543,000 in state funds for mobilizing the National Guard for flood duty.
Gregoire proposed new spending for children, vulnerable adults and seniors, and for caregivers. She proposes hiring new staff so that face-to-face visits with children in the state’s care are made every 30 days, providing better assessments for high-risk and complex abuse cases, and providing more help for families who have children with developmental disabilities.
Gregoire proposes rigorous fatality reviews whenever a vulnerable adult dies from abuse or neglect.
She requests money for respite and training for 500 more unpaid caregivers so seniors and developmentally disabled adults can remain with their families. A rate increase for adult family homes is also proposed.
She proposes a pay boost of about 1 percent for teachers, to keep up with the cost of living. Price tag: $31.2 million.
She also suggests wage increases at nursing homes. Cost: $15 million in state and federal funds.
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