When voters approved Initiative 900 in 2005, directing the state auditor to conduct performance audits of government agencies, they were expressing a clear belief that government wasn’t as efficient as it should be. Just as clearly, they were demanding improvement.
Legislative budget writers either didn’t get the message, or they’re content to ignore it. They slashed the voter-created performance-audit account by nearly three-quarters last month, removing $29 million from the 2009-11 budget. This was after state Auditor Brian Sonntag had agreed to a 50 percent reduction, on par with the hit some other agencies were taking in a difficult year.
If the larger cut stands, it would decimate the auditor’s ability to continue making sound recommendations for state and local governments to save money and provide better service — the very improvements voters demanded.
Sonntag had urged Gov. Chris Gregoire to work with lawmakers during an anticipated special session this month to restore at least $14 million in performance-audit funding. Now that such a session is a no-go, Gregoire is left with an all-or-nothing choice: leave the cuts in place, or veto them and restore the auditor’s previous funding level.
The only way to restore faith with the voters is to do the latter. A veto would allow the auditor’s office to stay on track with planned performance audits and continue identifying savings, thereby bolstering taxpayer confidence.
Cutting the performance-audit budget by any amount is short-sighted. The program has proven its worth. So far, according to Sonntag, 15 completed audits have identified nearly $500 million in cost savings and unnecessary spending for state government alone, at a cost of about 10 percent of those recommended savings. Name another investment that gets that kind of potential return.
The size of the cut carries an acrid air of vindictiveness, implying that the Legislature — its current leadership, anyway — doesn’t like being told how to spend the taxpayers’ money. Grumbling that the state spends too much time auditing itself has been heard frequently in the halls of the Capitol in recent years.
Legislative budget-writers, all Democrats, aren’t doing their own political longevity much good when they defy the voters’ will this way. Voters have demanded greater accountability from government. If their demands go unheeded for long, lawmakers shouldn’t be surprised when their displeasure is registered at the ballot box.
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