Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, October 12, 1995 TAG: 9510120028
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A-11 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: RAY L. GARLAND
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
A dismal view of voter interest may be premature because candidates of both parties are sitting on mounds of cash they will shortly unleash on advertising. Despite the bad press that campaign spending always gets, it generally serves to increase voter interest.
If that interest never materializes, it might represent a sensible judgment: that it doesn't matter much which party controls the state legislature, that both are equally beholden to their paymasters and most of what the state will do over the next two years is what it has been doing. As the British would say, "custom and practice."
No question, state government has an enormous presence. In the two years beginning next July 1, it will spend close to $35 billion, or about $2,500 a year for each man, woman and child. But more than half comes from the "special" fund, representing federal money designated by law for specific programs, highway-user taxes earmarked for the transportation trust, and charges collected from students at state institutions of higher learning.
One-seventh of all state spending in the 1994-96 biennium, or $4.6 billion, comes from the federal government. Whatever emerges from the Gingrichian revolution now in progress, one thing is clear: Members of Congress want state legislators to share the odium for raising revenues for social programs. The inescapable obligations of the federal government for debt service, Social Security, Medicare and national defense require Congress to cast off as much as possible to the states.
That brings us to the real heart of state spending, the general-fund budget. For 1994-96, it is just under $15 billion, representing per-capita spending of about $1,150 a year. It's here you find evidence that Virginia is a low-tax, low-spending state.
House Majority Leader Richard Cranwell of Roanoke County, who has emerged as the Democrats' swordsman in this election, has bravely seized the contrarian standard in these anti-government days, proclaiming far and wide that state taxes are already so low it's ridiculous to talk of reducing them.
Even Gov. George Allen seems to be backsliding on tax cuts he proposed last January, putting all his fiscal eggs in the one basket of sending state lottery profits back to localities, to be spent as they see fit, or used to reduce local taxes. If enacted, it would mean about $640 million less in state general-fund revenues in the next biennium. We might measure its significance by noting that in the same period, Virginia counties, cities and towns will spend about $24 billion.
The idea of shifting cash and choice to that level of government closest to the people is sound in theory. But will it resonate with voters? It isn't too late for the governor to resurrect his sensible idea of increasing the personal exemption on the state income tax from $800 each to $2,400, and more than a few GOP candidates are touting this. But deep into preparation for the new budget, Allen may be seeing he can't afford to do both.
Partisan rhetoric aside, it comes down to a difference of perhaps $300 million in state aid to education over the next two years. Considering that total state and local spending on education in that time will exceed $23 billion, it may never be noticed.
If we're going to do more for education, state colleges would have the logical priority. While Virginia is near the middle among the 50 states in spending on secondary schools, it's close to the bottom in higher education. But pleas of dire poverty by state colleges might be measured against the fact their all-inclusive charges are about $8,000 a year less than comparable private schools. Taxpayer support may be far from generous, but it's hardly a trifle.
But Democrats seem to have settled on putting many more computers in the public schools as the new magic elixir. Certainly, every high-school graduate should now know how to use a computer. More than 20 years ago, I tried to amend the standards of quality in public education to require basic mastery of the typewriter by the end of elementary school. But scattering computers in every grade won't get us very far.
A more sensible approach would be teaching every student to use the standard keyboard when they possess the necessary manual dexterity, which is around fifth grade, followed by special computer labs to explore the full potential of the machines. But with more than a third of Virginia students unable to read, write or calculate at even a minimal level, as state testing indicates, computers alone are hardly a panacea.
Virginia Republicans have tried to put a statewide slant on this election by having candidates sign a seven-point "contract for honest change." It pledges the party to prevent the early release of violent criminals by building adequate prison space, and to take "strong" action to curb juvenile crime, Allen's next big push. But mum's the word on costs. It also pledges to select judges in open meetings, which seems to fall short of the GOP's traditional pitch for a judicial nominating commission to reduce political influence in choosing judges.
Aside from pledging to return all lottery profits to localities and requiring parental notification in the case of minors seeking abortions, Republicans have stuck with generalities and aren't making a big deal of their "contract" with voters.
While many contests will be decided on the basis of purely local considerations, the governor has made himself the No. 1 issue. He's asking voters to do what few chief executives at midterm have accomplished successfully - to strengthen his hand by increasing his party's numbers in the legislative branch.
It's a high-risk strategy. Allen must now take to the hustings and the paid media to explain in terms most personal and persuasive why it should be so.
Ray L. Garland is a Roanoke Times columnist.
by CNB