Gov. Bill Ritter is putting the final touches on his first full budget. For the first time, we will see how the rubber meets the road with regard to the Democrat’s spending priorities.
In his State of the State address in January, Ritter laid out priorities from education to health care, transportation to public safety. Now comes the reality.
We know from last week’s economic forecast that the 2008-09 budget will reflect a $431.8 million increase in General Fund appropriations. At least 80 percent of that will go to mandatory increases for public schools, caseload increases in Medicaid, child welfare and other programs, and employee salaries. The rest can be divvied among higher education and other programs.
We hope to see some key changes in the way those remaining flexible spending dollars are doled out. Ritter said early on, for example, that he wanted to control prison costs and reduce recidivism, and we hope that is reflected in his new budget. The prison population ballooned under former Gov. Bill Owens. Rather than address sentencing laws in a proactive manner or push for intervention programs to keep people from offending, there was a rush to build more prisons.
Budget director Todd Saliman said that reducing recidivism is critical for Colorado. “It improves people’s lives, improves public safety and saves money. There is no down side,” he said.
Saliman said that a “recidivism package” was added to the current year’s budget after Ritter took office in January and may be expanded in coming years. Targeted for funding were community corrections, mental health, substance abuse and other programs aimed at keeping people from re-offending.
The state’s General Fund is limited to 6 percent growth under a 1992 law. Saliman said that higher education and transportation are among the governor’s top funding priorities.
New economic projections show that $1.3 billion will flow into transportation over the next five years from laws known as Senate Bill 1 and House Bill 1310, which earmark money for roads and transit. A blue-ribbon panel is preparing to recommend long-term transportation funding solutions.
Saliman describes the new budget as “frugal and proactive.”
While we expect the new budget to reflect a different philosophy from Ritter’s GOP predecessor, we still want to see a pragmatic approach to spending.
