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Walker, Dems Spar Over Projected Structural Deficit
By Wisconsin School Administrators Alliance staff | September 9, 2014
From WisPolitics . . .
Gov. Scott Walker is downplaying a new projection that pegs the state’s structural deficit at $1.8 billion, while Dems are accusing the guv and Republicans of reckless budgeting.
The Legislative Fiscal Bureau sent lawmakers a new projection yesterday, showing declining revenues had driven the structural deficit for 2015-17 to $1.8 billion from a $624 million projection in May.
During a stop in Waukesha yesterday, Walker insisted revenue growth would more than make up for the projected deficit. He sidestepped a question about where that revenue would come from, instead stressing average revenue growth over the past decade had equaled that mark.
“It’s not a new number. It’s new to the media, but it’s literally not a new number. They just took the number they reported on and applied it to the future budget,” Walker said of the LFB projection.
Dems accused Walker and the GOP-controlled Legislature of having “squandered” a surplus.
“While virtually every state in the nation has a surplus due to the improvements in the national economy, Wisconsin now becomes one of the select group of states that squandered it through irresponsible budgeting,” Assembly Minority Leader Peter Barca said in a conference call with reporters.
The state would be better off if it had followed the Democrats’ plan to use the projected surplus, Barca said. That included doubling the deposit into the state’s rainy day fund, increasing funding for worker training and directing targeted tax breaks to the middle class. He also said the budget would be in better fiscal shape had Walker accepted federal money to expand Medicaid.
Sen. Jennifer Shilling, the ranking Democrat on the Joint Finance Committee, said the projections paint a “dire picture” of the state’s fiscal health and accused Republicans of denying there is a problem.
“We have a fiscal storm on the horizon, and it seems my colleagues are unwilling to admit we have a problem,” Shilling said, adding that Legislature can’t address the issue “as long as Republicans continue to ignore the facts.”
Read the LFB memo here.
See Milwaukee Journal Sentinel Coverage here.
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