State Budget

In each year of budget shortfalls, efforts have been made to fix the problem solely through cuts in spending. These proposed cuts have seemed most draconian and inhumane in programs to help people with mental illness, developmental disabilities, and substance abuse problems. But they have also impacted education, environmental protection, health care, abused children, and, in fact, virtually the whole spectrum of vulnerable people assisted by the state. While advocates for these people have succeeded in protecting some services by persuading legislators to raise revenues, many of these revenue-enhancers have been regressive in nature, falling disproportionately on people of low income.

North Carolina faces a financial situation that is easy to summarize:  Tax cuts during the last half of the ’90’s have left the state with a revenue stream inadequate to provide the services which are expected by the state’s citizens and to respond to unexpected emergencies.  However, because the state’s political climate is less than hospitable towards tax increases, solutions to this situation will be more difficult to implement.

Oliver Wendell Holmes once stated that “taxes are the price we pay for a civilized society.”  In order for a civilized society to thrive, taxes at all levels of government must be sufficient to meet the legitimate needs of society, especially the modern equivalents of the biblical widows and orphans.

Recent years have seen a proliferation of “special provisions” in the state budget. While special provisions are not new, their increased use to bypass parts of the legislative process and to weaken the voice of the people is troubling. Special provisions are items included in the state budget that go beyond the mere allocation of state money. Some special provisions are clearly relevant and appropriate in the budget (example: a requirement that certain independent groups receiving state money report back to the General Assembly on how they spend it or a requirement that part of an appropriation be spent in a specific way). Other special provisions have only minimal relationship to the budget (example: increasing the penalties for drug crimes).