We're on the verge of concluding a whole month without a new state budget. Honestly, I never thought it would come to this.
Even if members of the state legislature reached a compromise this afternoon (not that there's any indication they will), 77,000 state workers won't get a paycheck tomorrow.
It's a hazardous situation, beyond any short-term problems it may cause.
The last time something like this happened, in 1991, a provision got inserted into the state budget that stopped basing education funding on the number of students in a district. Nobody seems to know who came up with this provision, or what he or she meant to accomplish. Given the atmosphere of crisis that prevaied at the time, trying to figure that out is like trying to investigate a single act of vandalism in the middle of a riot.
Nobody even noticed it at the time. Lawmakers became aware of it years down the line, when its cumulative effect caused some major funding problems for growing areas such as York County.
York County lawmakers played a major role in getting their colleagues from other affected areas to band together and eliminate the provision. But it took more than a decade for that to happen.
Let's hope that whatever version of the budget holds no similar unpleasant surprises.
Leave a comment