Glad I voted No on 8...would vote No again, and will probably vote No for Ted next time if he doesnt change this crap...
At a time of cutting, legislators still spend
04/06/03
LES ZAITZ
SALEM -- As a million-dollar remodeling of Capitol hearing rooms neared completion last year, it was time to deal with the old chairs.
Not only were they unsafe and ergonomically unfit, legislative managers said, but their lime green fabric clashed with the new decor.
Despite the state's financial troubles, the managers spent $212,000 for new chairs and farmed out the old ones as surplus -- at 77 cents each.
"These were nice," said Grant County Judge Dennis Reynolds, describing the 464 chairs his county bought as anything but shabby.
"They were quality-built chairs," he said. "I'm sitting in one right now."
Reynolds, who hauled his horse trailer to Salem to pick up a load of chairs, figures his county got a great bargain. It paid $360.01 for the lot -- $13.34 less than the Legislature paid for just one replacement.
"I questioned the wisdom in this tight budget year of replacing them," he said.
As the state budget spiraled into crisis last year, legislators spent more than a half-million taxpayer dollars on furniture, newsletters and travel to resorts in Hawaii and Florida, fiscal and spending records show.
Lawmakers also added temporary staff and used public money to have their pictures taken, hold retreats at hotels and pay consultants for advice on communicating with the public.
As some are quick to point out, the $800,000 in question is but a tiny fraction of the state's $10 billion budget and would not have had a significant effect on cuts in services and programs statewide.
"The Legislature is hardly a major budgetary burden for Oregon taxpayers," said House Democratic leader Deborah Kafoury.
But history has shown that at both the state and federal levels, the $640 toilet seat or the lavishly renovated public servant's office take on disproportionate significance in the minds of voters.
Gov. Ted Kulongoski has said he won't even consider changing the state's tax structure until he can convince Oregonians that Salem is spending the public's money effectively. He and his staff have made a public point of pinching pennies. For his part, Kulongoski gave up 5 percent of his pay and now flies coach on official business, including a recent trip to China.
"Some of the cuts that we have made in the state budget are symbolic and save little money," Kulongoski said. "But I believe it is important to show the citizens of Oregon that we are tightening our belts just like everyone else."
Some legislators agree.
"If we can find a way to save $100, it means a lot to folks," said state Sen. Bev Clarno, Senate Republican leader from Redmond.
The Oregonian's examination of legislative spending 18 months into the current biennium found plenty of missed opportunities for savings:
Legislators spent $232,425 on personal newsletters that one referred to as "puff pieces" but others defended as necessary.
Legislators have spent $110,000 for out-of-state travel, including a Hawaii conference subsidized by corporations whose lobbyists typically attend, getting private time with the legislators.
House Democrats paid $200 for help ghost-writing a magazine article; Senate Republicans paid $480 for Colorado and Montana bar association dues for their chief of staff; and legislative staff paid a consultant $5,000 to manage Christmas events at the Capitol.
Gary Weeks, director of the state Department of Administrative Services and the governor's chief cost-cutter, ordered agencies in February to stop out-of-state travel, furniture purchases, conferences, and even color copies.
"While it's not millions, it reflects our intention to look at every possible opportunity to do everything cheaper," said Weeks, whose cost-cutting imperative does not apply to the Legislature.
"I can't even tell you where they took cuts," he said.
Like other state agencies, the Legislature's budget is built by staff and leadership and goes through the legislative Joint Ways and Means Committee for approval. But it is exempt from the executive branch scrutiny imposed on agencies.
As Oregon's budget shortfall worsened last year, the Legislature ordered cuts for itself and state agencies, whittling medical help for seniors and children, forcing courts to close on Fridays and school districts to trim days.
State legislators last summer also rescinded two pay raises of $74 for themselves, taking their monthly salary to $1,283.
But legislative leaders acknowledge they barely felt the $5.7 million cut from their $64 million budget.
Hiring during layoffs As state troopers braced for layoffs in January, a new state employee reported for work -- whipping up continental breakfasts and hot lunches for legislators.
Despite impending budget cuts that would gut services to mentally ill Oregonians and others, the Legislature left enough money in its own accounts to hire the cook and two helpers to prepare meals in the private House lounge and cart some across the Capitol to the Senate lounge. They also set up salad bars, snacks and beverages.
The Senate and House lounges, open only to legislators, have been a tradition for more than half a century, fourth-floor retreats where they can escape the hubbub of the Capitol and catch a quick meal.
The three lounge employees have a full-service kitchen, from which they set out cold cereals, fruits and other light breakfast food in the morning and offer legislators hot meals, fresh-cooked soups and a salad bar for lunch.
Legislators pay $35 a week to cover the groceries. In the 2001 session, taxpayers picked up the $43,350 tab for the lounge crew and will do so again in the current session.
Some legislators say they need the food service to keep them going as they rush from morning to afternoon meetings and often work through lunchtime.
"We're on the run," said Kate Brown, D-Portland, the Senate Democratic leader.
In the House, Kafoury said, she doesn't have time to leave the Capitol for lunch and doesn't want to send out staff for her meals. Besides, she said, the public cost of the lounge service is minimal.
"You could cut those positions and it wouldn't amount to a drop in the bucket," she said.
Image, performance differ Legislators cast themselves as tightwads, but their performance doesn't always match that image.
State Rep. Karen Minnis, R-Wood Village, House majority leader last year and now speaker, said this in November: "We should look at all of government and ask, 'Is this an essential government service?' "
In February, she took another jab at government extravagance after a state agency spent $15,000 on new chairs for a conference room.
"You have this budget crisis going on, and the public sees this kind of expenditure," Minnis said. "It's pretty hard to justify."
But neither Minnis nor other legislative critics of government waste spoke up two months earlier when the Legislature spent $212,069 for its 539 new hearing-room chairs.
Legislative Administrator Dave Henderson, the body's chief of staff, said the purchase was part of the $1.6 million remodeling of the committee hearing rooms.
Minnis said through a staff member that she was aware of the total cost of the remodeling project but did not know about the chairs.
Grant County officials, who bought most of the old chairs, said they were in "excellent condition" and used some to furnish a new health clinic in John Day. They also shared their bargain with school districts and local agencies.
Minnis did a little refurnishing herself when she took over as House speaker in January. She spent $3,715 at the state prison factory for two desks, two bookcases, and a credenza to replace furniture she said was "pretty well destroyed."
But her predecessor, Republican Mark Simmons, said the old furniture was in good shape when he left. It was later put in storage.
Other leadership offices also bought furniture in January. The Senate Democratic caucus spent $843 on an oak conference table because the old one wasn't big enough for two new Democratic senators. The House Republican caucus spent $943 on two televisions and two VCRs so staff analysts could watch meetings while working on other projects.
In her Voters' Pamphlet statement last fall, Kafoury pledged to see that "our government is responsible with our limited resources."
She said the cost of producing a 122-page history trivia book about the Capitol and legislators was "definitely" a reasonable public expense. Kafoury's staff wrote and designed the book, which was handed free to legislators, employees and historians but isn't available to the public.
The $3,688 printing bill for the 400 copies was paid in September, as legislators endured their fifth budget-cutting session.
House Democrats paid for more history in January, spending $595 for photographs from the opening day of the 2003 Legislature. The photos included group shots of Democratic legislators and women legislators of both parties.
Images by Claudio, a Dayton photography studio, also took photos for the Republicans, including head shots of all 35 Republicans, a picture of the House Republican office staff, a group shot of Republican legislators and family photos of Minnis and Tim Knopp, the House Republican leader.
Minnis and Knopp paid for their family prints, but the House Republican office used public money to pay $1,772 for four hours of photography and 35 caucus pictures, 70 head shots of Republican legislators, and 12 staff photos.
Minnis said she considered the photos to be a reasonable expense.
On the road Last August, Minnis and her Husband, John, a state senator, flew to Florida for a meeting of conservative state legislators. By then, they had been through three budget-cutting special sessions and faced another one four days after returning from the Sunshine State.
The couple stayed at the Gaylord Palms Resort in Kissimmee, where the American Legislative Exchange Council was meeting. They also rented a car.
The resort is about 10 miles from the airport, but the couple drove 284 miles over six days. John Minnis said they "drove around the neighborhood" and went to nearby Disney World.
The two charged the trip's $2,289 cost to the state. That included a post-conference weekend at the resort and $464 for a Buick LeSabre. Minnis also brought her chief of staff, Gary Wilhelms, adding $1,496 to the cost.
Both Minnises said the conference was useful and at the time they had no inkling the state was headed for more severe budget problems.
But two months after that trip, legislators ordered millions slashed from the state budget, cuts that could be avoided only if voters approved a tax hike. Political forecasters predicted failure, and in December state agencies prepared for the worst and began notifying seniors, the disabled and families on state support. Juvenile camps prepared to close and the Oregon State Police announced layoffs.
As work on those cuts went on, legislators took to the skies, traveling from coast to coast for conferences they considered important to Oregon. Four legislators traveled to Washington, D.C., at a total cost of $3,799. One senator flew to Indianapolis for another meeting.
And six flew to Hawaii for something called the Pacific Conference. They stayed at the Sheraton Maui, which promotes itself as "the perfect place to transform a business meeting into a mini-vacation."
The Pacific Conference involved morning sessions on public policy issues and free afternoons. Legislators said their lodging costs were covered by the Pacific Conference, but they weren't sure where its money came from.
Conference officials said 29 of America's largest companies including ExxonMobil and General Motors -- paid $5,000 each to fund the conference, including legislators' room bills. The sponsorship guaranteed one company representative, typically a lobbyist, shared in the events with legislators.
Two legislators, Sen. Ryan Deckert, D-Beaverton, and Rep. Steve March, D-Portland, paid for their own flights. March intended to have the state pay, but he returned the expense check.
"It didn't feel appropriate to me to tell our departments that you can't do any out-of-state travel and then I tab the state for out-of-state travel," said March, who covered the cost with campaign funds.
Simmons, in his final days as House speaker, and state Sens. Ken Messerle, R-Coos Bay, and Roger Beyer, R-Molalla, charged their airfare to the state a total of $1,990.
Messerle and Beyer also rented a car, driving 264 miles over five days.
"There were opportunities in our off hours to explore Maui. We took advantage of that time," said Messerle, who had the state cover his share of the rental, $121.
Beyer said he paid his share out of his own pocket.
In February, state officials stopped out-of-state travel as a non-essential expense, and Senate President Peter Courtney followed suit in the Senate. The House didn't, leaving one state representative free to travel to Texas and to Washington, D.C., for meetings at taxpayer expense.
Legislators didn't have to leave Oregon to spend travel money. In December, the four legislative caucuses held retreats. The Senate Democrats and the House Republicans covered the costs through their political action committees.
The Senate Republicans charged the state $2,436 for a two-day session at the Hilton in Lake Oswego. Sen. David Nelson of Pendleton, caucus leader at the time, said it was "just a nice place to have a nice meeting" as Republicans considered the fate of a Senate split 15-15.
Clarno, who succeeded Nelson as caucus leader, said she had no idea the state had been billed for the retreat. After learning of The Oregonian's inquiries, she directed that the Senate Republican political action committee repay the state. The committee's check was delivered last week.
The House Democrats charged the state $2,744 for a two-day retreat in McMinnville.
Kafoury, the Democratic leader, said it was a reasonable state expense at the time.
"Today, I can't say we'd do it again," she said.
While other state agencies endure close questioning about their budgets, the Legislature doesn't give its own spending the same scrutiny. One legislator described the process as "somewhat mystical," and Henderson, the legislative administrator, acknowledged that legislators "don't have a lot of time to delve too deeply into it."
Clarno, who chaired the budget subcommittee that handled the Legislature's spending plan last session, said the budget-writers "don't get into the detail the way we really should."
That prompted another member of the Legislature's budget-writing committee to vote against the legislative budget in 2001.
"I didn't think we had scrutinized our own budget as well as we should have," said Rep. Mary Nolan, D-Portland. "There was no evidence that they had really dug into tightening our belts."
Courtney, the Senate president, shook his head during an interview in which he defended recent legislative spending for the food service, newsletters, and $13,000 for a press clipping service.
But he said such costs now have to be questioned.
"The whole legislative budget is going to be under intense scrutiny," Courtney said. Les Zaitz: 503-221-8181;
leszaitz@news.oregonian.com
[ 04-07-2003, 01:24 PM: Message edited by: Cool Texan ]
Another example of why I voted No on 28
TheRogue
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