Signs of Neglect, Wear and Tear in State Government

[TexasTowelie]

Dilapidated parks. Walls patched with toilet paper. Rodent urine leaking into the ceiling at a state school for deaf and disabled kids. Decades-old computer and technology systems. A backlog of pipeline safety inspections. Consumers getting “screwed” at the gas pump for lack of fraud investigators.

The signs of wear and tear in state government seem to be cropping up everywhere.

It didn’t happen overnight. The deterioration in state parks, hit by a series of budget cuts and outright raids on its supposedly dedicated funding by lawmakers, has been a running plot line in the papers for several years.

Likewise, the deferred maintenance at state buildings, which could cost almost $1 billion assuming the work begins now, dates backs a generation in some cases.

Read more: http://www.texastribune.org/2015/02/28/rats-bats-and-bureaucratic-woe-state-government/

[Mopar151]

1. Freemarket shit-lizards

One of the giant failures of finance-driven business philosiphy is the perceptions it generates - among them, that maintainence is a waste, and that cutting cost is the best way to improve productivity.

[DhhD]

2. Look at the Bills Conservatives have raised; tax breaks for the wealthy and business interest while

moving the tax burden to the lower classes and taking funds from Education, Medicaid, Infrastructure, shifting road building to foreign bondage, taking Federal Matching Funds (through Public Law), and more, to move toward trying to create a Texas black hole budget.

http://www.theyeagergroup.com/Downloadable%20Documents/Strayhorn%20Letter%20to%20Perry.pdf
Letter From Comptroller Carole Keeton Strayhorn to Governor
Rick Perry regarding the Perry Tax Plan
May 15, 2006
The Honorable Rick Perry
Governor, State of Texas
Capitol Building, Room 2S.1
Austin, Texas 78701
Dear Governor Perry:
The Legislature is concluding its work on your tax plan. Your plan is fiscally irresponsible -
- it includes an unconstitutional income tax on partnerships and unincorporated associations,
the largest tax increase in Texas history and leaves the largest hot check in Texas history.
What you should do is show true leadership and veto this legislation.
As the state's chief fiscal officer, it is my responsibility to spell out exactly what the Perry
Tax Plan means to our state's fiscal integrity. As you have known since it was made public,
your plan simply does not pay for itself. As of this moment, this legislation is a staggering
$23 billion short of the funds needed to pay for the promised property tax cuts over
the next five years.
In 2007, your plan is $3.4 billion short; in 2008 it is $4.3 billion short; in 2009 it is $5.4
billion short; in 2010 it is $4.9 billion short; and in 2011 it is $5 billion short. These are
conservative estimates.
At best, your plan is a prelude to another huge tax bill in the next regular session, one that
will not only be heaped on Texas businesses but will fall heavily on the same taxpayers you
claim to be helping now. At worst, it will relegate Texans to Draconian cuts in critical areas
like education and health care for at least a generation. This is not a victory for taxpayers. It
is a sham, and Texans will see it for what it is.
There is no economic miracle that will close the gap your plan creates. Even if every single
dollar of the current $8.2 billion surplus was poured into the plan, it would not cover the
plan's costs for more than two years, 2007 and 2008. The gap is going to continue to grow,
year by year. There are only two ways to close a chasm of that magnitude -- future tax
increases that you are hiding from Texans now or massive cuts in essential state services --
like public education -- already devastated by your past fiscal indifference.
I have outlined $7.7 billion in long-term "Strayhorn Solutions" to finance needed programs,
such as a significant teacher pay raise, real property tax cuts and fully restoring the
Children's Health Insurance Program. Those solutions include reinstating e-Texas
Performance Reviews and the Texas School Performance Reviews to the TexasComptroller's office, implementing video lottery terminals, closing corporate loopholes in
the franchise tax, eliminating the taxpayer-funded Texas Enterprise Fund and Emerging
Technology Fund, and a $1-a-pack increase in the cigarette tax tied to vital health-related
programs.
Texans deserve relief from high property taxes, but they do not need it at the expense of
future tax hikes and more cuts in public education. Educators are justifiably skeptical of this
program because they know that when the state controls the purse strings, rather than
locally elected school boards, the result will be devastating to our schools.
The property tax relief contained in the bill, if it can be financed past 2008, will be quickly
eroded by rising property values, and increases in local tax rates forced on local school
districts struggling to keep up with rising costs. In as little as five years, the state could be
right back in court.
Finally, your plan represents the largest tax bill in Texas history, includes an
unconstitutional income tax, represents a 200 percent tax increase on Texas businesses at a
time when the state has taken an $8.2 billion surplus out of the pockets of hardworking
Texans, and does not pay for itself as required by the spirit of our Texas Constitution's "payas-
you-go, no-deficit-spending" provision. That is unconscionable.
Governor, we should be working to improve state services for Texans and to reduce the
burden of government on businesses and individuals. This plan creates a rolling mess that
will take 20 years for future leaders of the state to untangle. Texans will recognize this plan
for what it is -- a short-term, smoke-and-mirrors patch at best.
I urge you to show true leadership and veto this legislation. Texas needs a school finance
plan that provides long-term, pay-as-you-go solutions for education.
Sincerely,
Carole Keeton Strayhorn,
Texas Comptroller
c: The Honorable David Dewhurst, Lieutenant Governor
The Honorable Thomas R. Craddick, Speaker of the House
Members of the 79th Legislature
Letter to Governor Rick Perry from the Comptroller Page 2 of 2

[DhhD]

3. For a generation to come or until Texas becomes Blue in the State House and Senate.

[blkmusclmachine]

4. Criminal.

14 Defining Characteristics of a Fascist Government:

http://www.rense.com/general37/char.htm

[malokvale77]

5. Sure TT...

but I am suppose to just shut up, because Texas is so fucking great.

I live here, but what the hell do I know?

God forbid I ever question the myth of Texas.

[Kip Humphrey]

6. Another GW legacy... an inevitability really... after he got rid of state income tax. Now, with oil

revenues in the shitter, that is precisely where Texas is headed.

[Arcadiasix]

9. TX has never had an income tax

There is a constitutional amendment against it. This amendment predates Perry and I think Shrub.

[Ilsa]

10. He reduced property taxes. The initial effect was for

Families to see their taxes go down about $5/month. But corporations got huge decreases. The difference was made up by increasing values and/or rates at the local level.

[appalachiablue]

7. Very sorry to hear this about Perry's 'open for business' Texas. In NJ, Christie's been meeting to

privatize the water systems. In Balto. a French corp. manages water, like in SA and elsewhere. This is the global neoliberal mafia system of privatization for profit at work, enriching oligarchs and creating income inequality worldwide. Hedge fund financiers and private equity vultures are circling Buffalo and Balto., like New Orleans after Katrina and Chicago where parking meters et al are being sold off thanks to Rahm and others.

[freshwest]

8. Not just Texas. It's national. It's the long-term strategy of privatization.

Last edited Sun Mar 1, 2015, 08:27 AM - Edit history (1)

Make parks undesirable until the public stops visiting and vandals take over. Then the unused, now vacant land becomes a neighborhood nuisance and is sold off. Same with the state schools. And all the other things on the list.

Texas is becoming third world although part of it always was. Not bad if one is well situated, in fact, pretty damn good. This is the case in much of SA and other nations. Since not all people will be hurt, but they will profit from the calamity befalling others. They have justifications for allowing this happen, just listen to cable news or talk radio to see the list of who they consider unworthy to thrive or even survive.

Between the growing Texas theocracy, as one cannot call it anything else, it won't be much different from places many fear. How very ironic that they get exercised over the anti-women and children and other religion hatred in some nations, but they are working to create the same atmosphere here. There is no difference in school girls being killed for wanting and women being beaten for not toeing the religious rules.

The gauntlet women have had to run thorough to get an abortion in the USA since the Reagan era, and the murders and increasingly threats on the lives of the women themselves and the outlawing women's agency over their own bodies, denial of equal treatment and being told to obey men in all things or be beaten is just the same with only names of the enforcers changed.

From the degradation of workers and infrastructure, and how cheap labor is forced to live, in time parts of the state will look like Mexico at its worst. Then why would they complain about immigants reducing the standard of living?

It's all a sham while they do what they say they despise. For a state that promotes being armed to the teeth and resisting any lawful authority, they sure are playing police state with women, minorities and emigrants.

Oh, they will get their Libertarian Paradise and rejoice in it. Those who are well-heeled, that is. The rest better move, submit or get the out of the way of their 'betters.' Conservatives will thrive, they already are.

Most of my life there, I lived under Democratic governors. Ann Richards lost to GWB, and it was incredible to me. GWB got in and everything began to go to hell. Perry continued the road to the Idiocracy. I'm sorry to dash anyone's hopes, but Texas will never return to anything close to the regulated and secular society it was when I was growing up and most years after school and then worked.

The structural changes have been too drastic. Take away agencies and systems such as Texas once had, and they never return. Texas is NEVER coming back.

It's my belief that the refusal to bend on DHS funding isn't about Obama's executive order on immigration or ego. Since 85% of the DHS budget is dedicated to FEMA disaster aid. Those who cheer it on 'our side' are ill-informed. It's a further disintegration of the safety net. Some have been fooled by propaganda.

The GOP voters, however are not fooled. They'll be cheering when the ice and snow ends this spring and the flooding begins. There will no help for communities that are affected. Many will be disadvantaged for the rest of their lives, and there will be no funding to help them, so let FEMA and DHS die on the vine.

We act as if this is stupid, no, we are for not realizing the real intent. Making fun of it is stupid. This is deadly serious, and the GOP mean millions of us great harm.

This is what the GOP wants, it is why they have blocked Medicaid expansion in Texas and other states. What has happened in Texas, as in NOLA, was an experiment in creating a feudal society. And it's working while both sides are cheering.