By Mike Baker
The Associated Press
OLYMPIA — Gov. Chris Gregoire said Thursday she expects a November special session focused on the budget to be a “brutal” gathering that could include even deeper cuts to state education spending.
Gregoire said she wants the Legislature back in Olympia to start official duties beginning Nov. 28, with groundwork laid in the weeks before.
The state needs to fill a projected hole of $1.3 billion in the current two-year budget cycle, and the Democrat said she’d like to find $2 billion in savings to leave the state with cash reserves.
“I don’t doubt one bit that I will hate this budget,” Gregoire said.
“I will hate it more than the last one.”
Gregoire said she’s waiting until after Thanksgiving because another forecast of state tax collections is due Nov. 17.
Odds are, that forecast will show the state has an even bigger hole in the budget than it’s facing now.
The new session comes just months after another special gathering in which lawmakers identified $4.6 billion in projected spending cuts — much of them in education.
Gregoire already has asked each agency to recommend cuts as high as 10 percent and said education faces reductions again.
“There will be more cuts in our public schools, our colleges and universities. It is simply unavoidable,” Gregoire said.
Tuition at public universities is already set to more than double over the span of her two terms in office.
Gregoire warned that the budget cuts could have major consequences: A 10 percent cut in the Department of Corrections, for example, could force the state to close three prisons and release the inmates.
Gregoire is focusing her plan to balance the budget with cuts only, although she didn’t remove from the table the idea of raising taxes.
Republicans have already vowed to oppose any tax increases, and they have the power to do so because of a voter-approved initiative that requires a two-thirds majority to raise taxes.
Democrats have talked about exploring ways to raise revenue, including the possibility of bringing a package to voters next year.
Party leaders in the Senate raised that possibility again in a statement Thursday.
“Over three years, we have reduced public service levels across the board, from support for kindergarten education to supervision of offenders in our communities,” Senate Majority Leader Lisa Brown and Democratic Sen. Ed Murray said in a joint statement.
“As we approach special session, we must recognize that more cuts — however necessary mathematically — will impact Washingtonians, their families and their communities,” they said.
Gregoire said nearly two-thirds of the budget is essentially off-limits to cuts because of federal mandates and state constitutional restrictions.
That means the $2 billion in cuts must come from the remaining $8.7 billion of the budget that is unprotected by the constitution or federal law, the governor said.
“That is, bottom line, a 23 percent cut,” she said.
State-subsidized insurance for the working poor, pay and benefits for state workers, aid to property-poor school districts and higher education are examples of spending that fall into the unprotected category.
