As Donald Rumsfeld once remarked, “you go to war with the army you have, not the army you might want or wish to have.” While he was talking about Iraq, the former defense secretary’s observation also applies to budget season in Concord.
Beyond some daunting arithmetic, there are other challenges at play in this year’s budget. Manchester Democrat Lou D’Allesandro is the state senate’s lead budget writer.
"It’s never been this complex in my years here. I came here in 1972. This is a real transitional time."
And the transitions D’Allesandro mentions are manifold. But to his way of thinking, the largest is a technical one.
“I think they key element in all of this is the system, the computer system that to me is the vital issue.”
The computer system in question has been in the works for years. It’s a stripped down version of a long planned 20 million dollar overhaul that was supposed to be complete two years ago. The House’s top budget writer, Marjorie Smith says the new system may force lawmakers to change some procedures, but expects it will improve their work. She stressed that any concern that the system won’t work is unwarranted.
“If it fails --and I don’t think it will -- we’ll deal with that, but I have enough things to worry about that are real problems, that I don’t worry about imaginary problems that the sky might fall. And the sky is falling in certain areas.”
Smith was speaking of what she termed essential state services. But she added that making wise budget decisions would be easier if the state had a comptroller, a job that’s been unfilled for two years.
“I think the absence of a comptroller is a serious problem. Any responsible business needs a comptroller; there are specific functions a comptroller carries out, and I hope that sooner rather than later that problem can be resolved.”
And that’s just one question mark on the personnel front. At present, the state also lacks a revenue commissioner. Governor Lynch has nominated Kevin Clougherty, a former finance director for the city of Manchester to fill that job, but he’s yet to be confimed.
“Sure, it’s always good to have a seasoned person who knows under which rock a few dollars can be found, but Kevin is extremely well-regarded.”
Republican Neal Kurk sits on the house finance committee, and used to be its chairman. He expects Clougherty will do just fine.
“It will take him a while to get up to speed, but because he was doing a lot of revenue estimating for the city of Manchester, he’s pretty knowledgeable. I think that will be a good choice and to some extent mitigate some of the uncertainty that some people might think occurs when a new commissioner comes in.”
There’s less uncertainly about another big player in the budget process, the commissioner of administrative services. Last year, Governor Lynch tapped Linda Hodgdon, who’d served as budget director for him and before that for Governor Jeanne Shaheen for that job. At the time, Lynch practically gushed.
“She is one of the smartest financial people I have ever worked with in the private sector or the public sector. And because of her understanding of state government, she knows what needs to be done.”
That said, like some other key commissioners in this budget process, heath and human services leader Nick Toumpas, for example, Hodgdon’s been pulling what some observers say amounts to double duty. In Toumpas’s case it’s been overseeing the state computer in the absence of a full time manager; Hodgdon’s been pitching in with that, running her department without a comptroller, to say nothing of helping Lynch and his new budget director craft the plan he must present lawmakers after the turn of the year. When asked about these stresses, the Governor says all is going according to plan, even if key jobs remain unfilled.
“Even without, we are stronger today then we were four years ago. Clearly we need to fill those positions, but we are stronger today than we were four years ago.”
In the meantime, the governor is slated to announce up to 60 million dollars in cuts to the current budget tomorrow morning. Hearings on the next two year budget begin in the afternoon.
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SO, let me see. They got us into this mess but we are better off than ever? I'm sorry this man did not deserve a second term let alone a third.