Announcement

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For those of who have been wondering why the Blog has not been updated, the short answer is that the Blog will be moved over to WordPress and resume in January. Apologies for not making that announcement sooner.

The reasons include that Blogger does not play well with tables -- of which I have many -- and that WordPress should allow for more customization and better search engine optimization.

Please stay tuned, and the new link will be provided shortly.

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How much did the State aid the Harvard Pilgrim Turn-Around?

Megan Woodhouse has an interesting piece in the Boston Globe relative to how much the state helped in the turn-around. The article argues that a $58.5 million "accounting error" back in 2000, shortly after Baker took over at Harvard Pilgrim had the insurer teetering on the brink of insolvency. It was Democratic Attorney General Tom Reilly who rode to the rescue, argues the article, by petitioning the Supreme Judicial Court to put Harvard Pilgrim into receivership, thereby granting the organization protection from creditors.

Baker still gets credit in the article for his astute leadership of Harvard Pilgrim -- but the point of it is that the state and it's willingness to intervene should also be credited.

Pledge on No New Taxes

Joan Vennoichi has a story in the Boston Globe relative to newly-minted Gubernatorial candidate Charlie Baker making the George H.W. Bush pledge on "read my lips: no new taxes." I got to go with Joan on this one: this isn't the smartest pledge to make. Even for the Governor's who ostensibly didn't raise taxes (see Mitt Romney) they ended up closing "tax loopholes" and raising fees through the roof. I don't think that really ends up saving the average taxpayer a lot of money.

Details on Governor's Vetoes

Although the Governor has published a document entitled "parchment" on his veto page, and that document does give the details of what the Governor has and has not vetoed, it's not really the most user friendly document.

First of all, it doesn't tell you the name of the items that the Govenror vetoed. To get that information you either must have memorized the items or go to a different document on the Governor's website.

Here at the budget blog, in order to be helpful to our loyal readers -- sparse though they may be -- we've created one document that lists all the line-item vetoes in chronological order, with the Governor's explanations, and with the language that the Governor proposes to delete from the line-items. Our doucment also includes the outside sections that the Governor proposes either to vetoe, or to substite for with new outside sections. It's all clickable below:

Where's the Veto message?

In the category of things that are not being published on the state website, I think we have to add the Governor's veto message, which has already received a bill number -- House 4139 -- but the text of which is nowhere to be found on the House website.

How long does it take to print the Governor's veto message? Didn't the Governor sign the budget back on June 26? Didn't the Governor publish his vetoes on his own website a couple of days later? How long does it take to format a bill for printing?

Governor's Fy 2010 Supplemental

Well, it didn't take long for the Governor to file the first supplemental budget for FY 2010. Normally one of those isn't filed until at least a few months into the fiscal year. This supplemental, according to the Governor, appropriates $269.4 million to "address immediate exposures identified for the upcoming fiscal year."

I guess that makes up for the $147 million in vetoes that the Governor just issued. Most of the dough ($70 million) is to continue funding the state-subsidized universal health care program adopted a couple of years ago under the Romney administration. The program, it turns out, has been more successful in getting the uninsured enrolled than the architects of the program actually thought it would be. I guess that cuts both ways, since the success must be funded.

A little Self-Congratulatory

It seems like the legislature is being a little self-congratulatory about the fact that they actually passed, and the Governor actually signed, the FY 2010 before July 1st, the beginning of the fiscal year. At least according to an article in the Boston Globe by Eric Moskowitz. Of course, that article also points out that "In the previous 10 years, Beacon Hill missed the start of the fiscal year seven times, with lawmakers and the governor blowing deadline by an average of 38 days." So bully for them for getting it done this year. Of course, I'm not sure I'd get carried away with the occasional success when the performance has so consistently been lacking.

The Unions have Miscalculated on this one

The Boston Globe reports this morning that the police and firefighter unions have filed suit challenging pension reform, claiming that the reform illegally strips them of benefits. Whatever the legal merits of that argument -- and I'm no expert on pensions -- the political fallout is clear. Here is an excerpt from the article:

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Unions sue over pension changes Police, firefighters call overhaul illegal; Say it discriminates against disabled By Andrea Estes, Globe Staff | July 3, 2009 Police and firefighter unions filed twin class-action lawsuits against the state yesterday, arguing that a new law designed to curb pension abuse illegally strips them of benefits guaranteed by the state constitution and federal law. The Boston Police Superior Officers Federation, Professional Fire Fighters of Massachusetts, and Boston Firefighters Union Local 718 - on behalf of public employees statewide - assert in a suit filed in US District Court that a provision in the new law amounts to breach of contract. The law, they argue, unfairly reduces retiree benefits by limiting what kinds of compensation count toward their pension. Under the new rules, public employees can no longer use additional pay - such as educational stipends, uniform allowances, and the value of unused vacation and personal days - in their pension calculation. Most public employees, lawyers for the unions say, use such extras to raise their base pay substantially, which in turn boosts their retirement checks. A second suit, filed in Suffolk Superior Court by the Superior Officers Federation and the Professional Fire Fighters of Massachusetts, challenges a new calculation of benefits for police officers and firefighters who are injured on the job, contending that the new law discriminates against disabled workers by treating them differently than other workers. With the new pension law, disability benefits will be based on workers’ salaries for the year prior to when they became disabled, not the year prior to their retirement. It can take months, even years, for retirement boards to approve disability pension requests. In the meantime, employees out on injury leave are entitled to pay raises and cost-of-living increases. In the past, those pay increases would boost a worker’s disability pension by thousands of dollars a year, union lawyers said. Together, the two lawsuits represent a direct challenge to efforts at cracking down on pension abuse and excesses by some public employees, which have been highlighted by a series of stories in the Globe. If the suits are successful, public workers could see their old benefit levels restored and taxpayers could be forced to pay damages. Andrea Estes can be reached at estes@globe.com.

© Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company

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Now if you look at the reader comments that were posted in response to that article, the verdict is unanimous, and far from charitable:

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READER COMMENTS (120)

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	stowe wrote: Union Scums! 7/2/2009 11:29 PM EDT Recommend (33) Report abuse Permalink
	bf5113 wrote: They were caught with their hands in the 'cookie jar' and are now suing to get the 'cookie jar' returned so that can continue stealing from it. What a bunch of jerks! They have no shame. 7/2/2009 11:49 PM EDT Recommend (43) Report abuse Permalink
	dislocatedworker wrote: Agree with both comments. Like the firefighter who was muscle building, and wasn't there a restraining order from a girlfriend? How many people on any disability are truly disabled. It hurts it for those who TRULY have a disability. There are many who milk the system. They could be your neighbors, ladies out meeting their friends for lunch, working under the table, etc. It is rampant. So sad people don't have integrity or pride. For those truly disabled, of course, they should receive everything coming to them! 7/3/2009 12:24 AM EDT Recommend (27) Report abuse Permalink
	pinopino wrote: Scr3w them. Dissolve these Unions. 7/3/2009 12:36 AM EDT Recommend (31) Report abuse Permalink
	pinopino wrote: These id1ots don't realize that the result of this is that many more investigations will be initiated and all the scumbags who have been faking disability will be busted. It's about time. That is exactly what the state wanted. 7/3/2009 12:38 AM EDT Recommend (22) Report abuse Permalink
	johnm4 wrote: Unreal... 7/3/2009 12:40 AM EDT Recommend (16) Report abuse Permalink
	DJLBoston wrote: Man these guys are bad. 7/3/2009 12:41 AM EDT Recommend (14) Report abuse Permalink
	phonyuser wrote: There really aren't too smart. This will just create more (well deserved) backlash. The next time the contract comes around they will get even less. How about we just cut out the pensions completely, like most private companies. If they don't like it, they can find new jobs. 7/3/2009 12:41 AM EDT Recommend (24) Report abuse Permalink
	Jane53 wrote: Oh give me a break!! These folks should try living like the rest of us for a change !! What they were doing was STEALING from tax payers!!! I have no sympathy for these people at all! 7/3/2009 12:42 AM EDT Recommend (25) Report abuse Permalink
	devilsadvocate wrote: No group in power in MA has any shame, nor (based on past performance) do they need to. Imagine that, people on the public dole might not get to pad their pensions! Imagine this - most people I know don't have pensions and have their 401K's suspended until further notice. But no, the legislators and public employees would rather go to court (another cost to taxpayers to litigate) and incur legal fees on both sides just to prove a point. Shameless. The more they cry poor, the less anyone who isn't on the state dole cares for what might be other legitimate concerns. Here's hoping the judiciary sits this one out.

Changes from Conference to Enacted

I thought that it might interesting to take a look at the question of what differences there are in the FY 2010 Conference Report and Enacted Budget with respect to the line-items, including the inside language. Basically, I was curious to see how House Counsel might have changed any of the inside language, and if any other things were added or dropped.

The table below sets forth all the changes that I found. These include:

• A few instances where quotes were added;
• Differences in whether "Internet" was capitalized (it should be);
• Differences in whether an "em" dash or "en" dash was used, and whether there were spaces around the dashes.

I'm happy to report that I did not find any other differences. In short, nothing nefarious was snuck in.

FY 2010 Budget has appeared on State Website

In an unusual show of efficiency and dexterity, the state website has already published the FY 2010 budget (Chapter 27 of the Acts of 2009). Of course, the published act does not include the Governor's vetoes. This document will have to be updated with those and, once they happen, the veto overrides.

Still no Bill Histories

It's July 1st -- we're at the end of the fiscal year and half way through the legislative year -- and the Legislature still has not managed to redesign it's bill history system to make it available to the public. As you can see below, the latest bill history you can find is for the previous session, the 185th session, for the 2007-08 legislative session.

I'm not unsympathetic to the difficulties of rewriting code and putting up a new system, but folks . . . isn't this now in the province of "ridiculous?"

Al Franken delcared the Winner

Remarkably enough, Al Franken was actually declared the winner of the second Minnesota Senate seat by the Minnesota Supreme Court. How about that? Took long enough. For those of you interested in the details, you can read the MN Supreme Court decision by clicking on this link.

Patrick hints at an Increase in the Gas Tax

Governor Patrick is indicating this morning that after signing a budget with $1 billion in tax increases, he still thinks there may need to be an increase in the Gas tax to put the state financial system on "sounder financial footing." See Matt Viser's story in the Boston Globe.

While I applaud Patrick's desire to put the transportation system on a sounder financial footing, I fear this might very well raise the spectre of "Taxachusetts" once again. If you've just finished wiht a significant increase to the sales tax -- an increase that I predict may become even more unpopular than previous increases to the income tax -- then suggesting that a gas tax increase needs to be piled on top of that will, I believe, generate significant political opposition.

Continued Budget Sleight-of-Hand

I keep being amazed that this budget is referred to as a $27 billion budget, and that it's allegedly $400 million less than the House or Senate budgets. See, for example, Matt Viser's piece in the Boston Globe today, relative to Gov. Patrick signing the budget. Unfortunately, those numbers are simply not correct.

Let's review: this is a $27.4 billion budget if you count only the direct appropriations and retained revenue and leave out chargebacks and federal grants. In other words, if you only count section 2, and not sections 2B and 2D. Unfortunately for the spin-meisters, sections 2B and 2D are part of the budget.

So why are they engaging in this sleight of hand? They don't want people to know how much they're really spending. Here are the real numbers:

Direct Appropriations.......$26,907,008,724

Retained Revenue...............$499,891,667

Chargebacks....................$391,745,702

Federal Grants...............$2,484,750,685

Grand Total.................$30,283,396,778

So, how does this compare with the previous budgets. It turns out that the legislature is proposing to spend more in FY10 then they spent in FY09. Here are the real numbers, incuding direct appropriations, retained revenue, chargebacks AND federal grants:

FY09 Enacted................$29,729,332,117

FY09 after 9c Cuts..........$27,604,356,138

FY10 Governor...............$30,870,923,459

FY10 House..................$29,826,460,083

FY10 Senate.................$30,021,874,638

FY10 Conference.............$30,283,396,778

So in effect, with the increase to a 6.25% sales tax, the legislature is really proposing to increase the spending for FY09 from $27.6 billion to almost $30.3 billion.

Now, I'm not unsympathetic to the Legislature's desire stabilize spending on the budget and restore some of last year's 9C cuts. The voters tied their hands pretty good with their repeated insistence that the income tax rate should be only 5%, and previously, with their approval of Proposition 2½. Consequently, the Legislature turned to the one broad-based tax that they thought was still available to them, the sales tax. In addition, they enacted pension reform, transportation reform and ethics reform, in part to blunt Governor Patrick's threat to veto the sales tax and in part, one hopes, because it was the right thing to do.

But now they should do the right thing on budget transparency. They should admit that this is not a $27.4 billion budget but a $32.3 billion budget, and that is an increase over the FY09 budget. That increase is driven, at least in large measure, by the unexpected success of the Universal Health Law, and the continued increase in overall health care costs (an issue that most private businesses are intimatley familiar with.)

Turnpoke rescinds Toll Increase

Well, there's one piece of good news out there, which is that the Turnpike did finally rescind the manifestly unfair toll increase that they had proposed earlier this year. With Patrick signing the budget that basically diverts a portion of sales tax revenue to bail out the Turnpike for the next three months, the toll increase is obviouly not needed. See Noah Bierman's story on the Turnpike Tolls in the Boston Globe.

There were some snippy remarks by readers relative to the Turnpike toll rescissions -- my favorite was, "Shouldn't the headline read 'Soon-to-be private citizens at soon-to-be defunct authority make gratuitous gesture'" -- but I don't think it's a gratuitous gesture. The elimination of the Turnpike doesn't necessarily mean the elimination of Turnpike tolls, as their are still oodles of Turnpike bonds that need to be reissued in some way.

In short, I think it's good news, and worth celebrating as a modest victory. (Click here to see a PDF of the vote and the Turnpike's current budget.)

Three Reform Bills

In a remarkable flurry of productive activity, the House and Senate have each passed transportation, pension and ethics reform. It looks like the Governor is going to get what he wants -- he won't have to veto the sales tax increase after all -- which may or may not be good news for the Governor. In any case, here is what we now have:

• HB 4133 - Ethics Reform (47 pages)
• SB 2079 - Pension Reform (8 pages)
• SB 2087 - Transportation Reform (175 pages)

In the succeeding weeks, we will look in a little more detail at what these bills actually do. In the meantime, we have to make do with the section-by-section summaries posted on the legislative home page, which have provided us with the following:

• Ethics Reform section-by-section
• Transportation Reform section-by-section (House version)

It's now Clear how they got to $27.4 Billion

I don't why it took me so long to grasp this, but what's now apparent that the way the legislature got to the "$27.4" billion budget is by only counting the direct appropriations and retained revenues, but not the chargebacks or federal grants. In other words, they only counted what was in section 2, and not what was in section 2B and 2D. That, however is -- and how do we put this? -- "disingenuous." The chargebacks and federal grants, whether they like it or not, are part of the budget. So, wouldn't be better to be honest about the true costs here?

Title                                  House          Senate         Conference   Sec
========================================================================================
Total for Direct Appropriations
          and Retained Revenue  $28,126,227,842  $27,326,828,832   $27,414,241,896   2  
Totals for Chargebacks             $401,402,034     $398,991,853      $390,982,830   2B 
Total Federal Grants             $2,366,949,242   $2,286,543,697    $2,485,936,271   2D 
Totals for All Types            $30,894,579,118  $30,012,364,382   $30,291,160,997   All 

More Proof this is no $27.4 Billion Budget

A couple of days ago I reported that this budget is actually more like a $30.3 billion budget than the $27.4 billion budget reported in the media. Now I have more proof from the Governor himself. The Governor has been updating his own website with not only his revised budget -- revised in light of the declining revenues -- but has also been keeping up a spreadsheet that compares the appropriation amounts from the various versions of the budget. This spreadsheet -- "fy10compare" -- documents the fact that even without the federal grants, the Conference report is actually $27.8 billion and not $27.4 billion. If you add in the 447 federal grants, the budget total, as previously reported, is actually just shy of $30.3 billion.

Click here to see a list of the 447 federal grants included in the Conference Report.

Conference Committee Report, Take 2

In case you hadn't noticed, the House and Senate have posted a new version of the Conference Committee Budget, since the version that they had originally posted on Friday morning had so many formatting errors in the revenue and local aid tables. As far as I can tell they have not revised any of the numbers or language -- that would be truly feckless, even for the Legislature -- but they have cleaned up the tables and the formatting.

• Click here for the first version of the Conference Committee report, released on Friday morning, June 19.
• Click here for the second version of the Conference Committee report, released on Monday, June 22.

Comparison of House, Senate, Conference Appropriations

We've completed our analysis of the House, Senate and Conference budgets, and the numbers don't add up to what was reported in the news with respect to how much the budget actually costs. Below is our spreadsheet that compares the House, Senate and Conference numbers:

The press reported that this is a $27.4 billion budget, but our numbers indicate that it's a $27.8 billion budget, and then only if you don't include the federal grants. However, the problem with that is that the federal grants are appropriated for, and they are part of the regular budget. Our numbers indicate that the conference committee actually approved a $30.3 billion budget (as can be seen below).

     Type                       House           Senate          Conference
     =======================================================================
     Direct Appropriation  $26,564,903,856  $26,827,416,172  $26,907,008,724
     Chargeback               $400,189,124     $391,745,702     $391,745,702
     Retained Revenue         $467,318,771     $503,056,162     $499,891,667
     Subotal               $27,432,411,751  $27,722,218,036  $27,798,646,093
     Federal Grants         $2,394,648,332   $2,300,842,188   $2,485,936,271
     =======================================================================
     Grand Total           $29,827,060,083  $30,023,060,224  $30,284,582,364

Click here to see a spreadsheet that compares all the House, Senate and Conference Report Appropriations.

Am I wrong? Show me where. I'm using the numbers that the House and Senate reported in their respective budgets and in the Conference committee reports.

Joint Rule 11A Conference Reports

Under the requirements of Joint Rule 11A, the Conference Committee has also put out several reports that note the resolution of the various items in conference. There are three of these reports posted on the State, dealing consecutively with:

• Differences in Section 2 (direct appropriations) between House and Senate engrossed budgets.
• Differences in Section 2B (chargebacks) between House and Senate engrossed budgets.
• Differences in Outside Sections between the House and Senate engrossed budgets.

Budget Conference Report Released

The House and Senate have released their conference report on the Budget. The Conference Bill number is House 4129, and this behemoth was printed at 1:25 a.m. last night and released to the web at 6:15 a.m. this morning (notwithstanding that the budget was allegedly "released" last night). It appears that the printing was a bit of a rush job as the tables for revenues and local aid are basically . . . how does one put this politely? . . . all screwed up.

Budget Monitor Review of new House Budget

The Massachusetts Budget and Policy Center has compiled a new Budget Monitor report, which looks at the Governor's revised budget and compares it to the budgets engrossed by the House and Senate. This is a detailed 26 report that divides the budget up into the various topica parts of government, such as educaiton, health care, human services, transportation, public safety, etc.

Governor Patrick's Revised FY 2010 Budget.

This may have escaped your notice, but at the end of last week, the Governor put out a revised FY 2010 budget. What's the point, given that the House and Senate have already engrossed their own budgets and are already at Conference?

Beats me.

My guess is that the Governor feels the need to weigh in politically, given the dramatically reduced (and predictable) revenue estimates. In any case, the Governor published a press-release on the matter.

According to the Governor's website, the difference in aggregate numbers from what he had recommended before and what he is recommending now is as follows:

Sales Tax Increase a Certainty

The Boston Globe reports today that Massachusetts business advocates and Republican lawmakers are resigned to the certainty of a sales tax increase. Given that the 5% to 6.25% increase is in both engrossed budgets, I'd say they're pretty much dead on. The two constituencies still battling are package store operators and satellilte TV companies, who opposed specific tax increases added to the Senate budget that impact their particular industries.

Three for Three on Speaker Indictments

Well, I trust that by now most of you know that we're now three-for-three on indictments of former speakers. To wit:

• First there was Charlie Flaherty, who pled guilty to tax evasion and ethics violations.
• Then, there was Tom Finneran, who pled guilty to obstruction of justice and was placed on 18 months probation.
• Now we have Sal DiMasi, indicted on seven counts of mail and wire fraud and five counts of criminal conspiracy, all to help Cognos software win two state contracts.  In return,  Salutatorian Sal got $57,000 in cash.

For risking 20 years in prison, you would have thought Sal would have done something bolder, made more money.

Conspicuously absent from this list, by the way, is former Senate President Billy Bulger who, his brother notwithstanding, has never been indicted for anything.  Of course, he did make a nice pension haul and failed to cooperate in the search for his brother, but he's had the good sense never to do anything indictable.  And trust me, if he had, they would have indicted him.

Set forth below is a copy of the actual indictment against  Sal DiMasi and associates Joseph Lally, Richard McDonough and Richard Vitaly:

House vs. Senate Inside Language

Well, we're back from a blessed week off and away from budget stuff.  Hope we weren't unduly missed.  In any case, to get back on-track, set forth below is an extensive redline version of the inside language from the House (HB 4101) and Senate (SB 2060) engrossed budgets:

Local Aid comparison for FY 2010

We've also been running some numbers comparing Local Aid from FY 2009 to the various proposals made in FY 2010. As you can see, the Local Aid numbers will definitely be going town from the $5.26 billion that was allotted in FY 2009. While the House is now at $5.2 billionm the Senate stayed at $4.9 billion, virtually assuring a real decrease for FY 2010.

           Actor   Local Aid Totals for FY 2010
           ====================================
           FY09 .................$5,262,370,332
           GOV ..................$5,042,908,473
           HWM ..................$5,022,107,434
           HFA ..................$5,213,217,134
           SWM ..................$4,879,765,707
           SFA ..................$4,914,765,707

Click here to view a comparison table of Local Aid from FY09, the Governor, House and Senate.

Comparative Analysis of Appropriations

The spreadsheet below sets forth a comparative analysis of appropriations. Our analysis is that the budget is still hovering around $30 billion, and that with the sales tax increase to 6.25% (and other revenue enhancements), it looks like the Senate restored more that $2.5 billion in spending.

           Actor ...Total Appropriation for FY 2010
           ========================================
           FY09 ....................$29,666,643,801
           GOV .....................$30,870,923,459
           HWM .....................$29,351,895,971
           HFA .....................$29,826,460,083
           SWM .....................$27,415,699,490
           SFA .....................$30,019,374,638

The detailed analysis is set forth below.  Keep in mind that the columns here represent the following "actors" in state government and the budgets that they have recommended:

• FY 2009 enacted budget
• Governor's House 1 recommendations
• House Ways & Means recommendations
• House Engrossed (HB 4101), printed as amended
• Senate Ways & Means recommendations
• Senate Engrossed (SB 2060), printed as amended

Please note also that for "ATP" (or Approrpiation Type) the following applies:

• 1C: direct approrpriation
• 1I: chargeback between agency
• 1R: retained revenue (by agency generating the revenue)
• 4F: federal grant

Click here to see the comparative spreadsheet in its entirety.

MBPC review of the Senate Budget

The Massachusetts Budget and Policy Center (must reading for any serious budget wonks) has done a preliminary analysis of the Senate Engrossed budget.  Their report notes that:

• the increase in sales tax from 5% to 6.25% (and elimination of the sales tax exemption for alcohol) should generate approximately $730 million in FY2010;
  
• the Senate used this revenue to restore about $550 million of the $3 billion that the Ways and Means Committee had recommended in budget cuts;
  
• the Senate allocated $275 million to avert a toll increase on the Massachusetts Turnpike, to address the budget crisis at the MBTA and to support other transportation programs.
  

Senate President promises Transporation Reform

Boston.com reports that the Seante President has promised to enact transportation reform before the budget hits the Governor's desk.  That would avoid toll hikes -- currently scheduled to kick in on July 1st -- and blunt the Governor's threatened veto of the Sales Tax if he didn't see some reform first. Given that Transportation is the "big money" reform -- i.e., the one that could end up saving the state the most amount of money -- let's hope that the Senate President can deliver on this promise.

Senate Printed Budget Just Released

The Senate Budget, printed as amended, now has the bill number SB 2060.  The text of the document has been published, and is shown below.  Needless to say, we'll be doing some analysis fo the budget, and should have various numbers to you all over the next few days.

Another Thing that Might have Escaped your Attention

Another thing that might have escaped your attention is the fact that the Senate gave new document numbers to three amendments.  They are:

1. Amendment #1 (Municipal Finance), reprinted as SB 2053
2. Amendment #46 (Sales Tax Increase), reprinted as SB 2054
3. Amendment $62 (Local Aid), reprinted as SB 2055.

How do I know this?  Somebody told me.  It's not because there is anything on the Senate website that would allow me or any other reader to know that.  And, it turns out that the text that is posted on the website for Amendment #46 and #62 is pretty much the same as in the printed amendment, but not so with Amendment #1, which has been completely rewritten in the amended form as SB 2053.

Among the little changes that they made is to change the Chapter 64L from a chapter relative to Taxation on Meals to one which is now concerned with "TAXATION OF DIRECT BROADCAST SATELLITE SERVICE."  That's a change worth noticing.

The Senate was Changing Results without Notice

If you weren't paying attention you may have missed the fact that the Senate was changing actions between Wednesday and Friday of last week without giving the rest of us any notice of that fact.  The table below represents six different actions with respect to amendments where it turns out that what the Senate posted on its website on Wednesday (May 20th) was not the same as what was posted on the website on Friday (May 22nd).

ID	Sponsor	Title of Amendment	5-20 Actions	5-22 Actions	Changed
10	Richard T. Moore	State Government Accountability, Economy, and Efficiency	Rejected	Adopted	TRUE
54	Sonia Chang-Díaz	Closing to Tobacco Loopholes	Rejected	Withdrawn	TRUE
56	Richard R. Tisei	Wage and Hiring Freeze	Pending	Rejected	TRUE
56.1	Stephen M. Brewer	Wage and Hiring Freeze Further Amendment	Adopted	Withdrawn	TRUE
237	Thomas M. McGee	E Team Machinist	Withdrawn	Rejected	TRUE
419	James E. Timilty	EOPS Administration	Withdrawn	Rejected	TRUE

 

Senate Floor Amendment Results

The final results are in -- with the caveat that the Senate website is still missing a handful of outcomes, and, they've been known to change results on their website after the fact -- and the're listed below.  As the day proceeds we should have more detailed analyses of whose amendments were adopted, how much they cost, and some statistics around the percentage of adopted, rejected, withdrawn and bundled amendments.  So stay tuned.  Here are the results as best we know them now:

Only in Massachusetts

I think only in Massachusetts would we have a bill entitled "Repeal the Pacheco Law" while Pacheco is still in the room.  And this debate was a predictable canard for them to take on.  On the other hand, I have to say that I'm surprised to here Fred Berry get up and argue against the Pacheco law.  And maybe he has a point.  In any case, the text of the amendment is set forth below:

Repeal of Pacheco Law

Mr. Tisei moved that the bill be amended by inserting after Section 7 the following new Section:
“SECTION 7A.  Sections 52, 53, 54 and 55 of Chapter 7 of the General Laws are hereby repealed.”
And moved to further amend the bill by inserting after Section 61 the following new Section:-
“SECTION 61A.  Section 5 of Chapter 268A of the General Laws, as appearing in the 2000 Official Edition, is hereby amended by striking out in lines 29 through 40, the following words:- “or (f) a former state employee whose salary was not less than that in step one of job group M-VII in the management salary schedule in section forty-six C of chapter thirty, and who becomes an officer or employee of a business organization which is or was a party to any privatization contract as defined in section fifty-three of chapter seven in which contract he participated as such state employee, if he becomes such officer or employee while the business organization is such a party or within one year after he terminates his state employment, unless before the termination of his state employment the governor determines, in a writing filed with the state ethics commission, that such participation did not significantly affect the terms or implementation of such contract.”

And moved to further amend the bill by inserting after Section 64 the following new Sections:-

“Section 64A.  Section 274 of chapter 110 of the acts of 1993, as amended by Section 3 of chapter 296 of the acts of 1993, is hereby further amended by striking out the last two paragraphs. 
Section 64B.  Section 4 and Section 5 of chapter 296 of the acts of 1993 are hereby repealed.”

Now it's on to Public Employees

Now that we've done taxes, local aid and gambling, it's on to public employees.  (When are we going to get around to religion and sex?)  The Republicans want to impose a wage freeze on public employees and a hiring freeze on the state in general.  The text of the bill is set forth below:

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Mr. Tisei moved that the bill be amended by inserting, after Section __, the following new Section: -

“SECTION __.  Notwithstanding any special or general law to the contrary no department or agency of the commonwealth may increase the compensation of any employee in excess of an employee’s compensation rate as of June 30, 2009.  In addition, no department or agency may fill any vacancy, unless said vacancy is deemed critical to public safety, and a letter to such effect is transmitted to the secretary of administration and finance prior to the hiring of any new employee and said communication is returned with a signed approval by said secretary.  This section shall expire on July 1, 2011.”

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A wage freeze is, by the way, probably the right call on the merits. The pro-labor division of the Democrats want the issue to be resolved through collective bargaining, which I think is also correct. Most of the public employee unions have already agreed to a wage freeze.  In any case, a wage freeze would be largely cosmetic, as it saves very little in relationship to the magnitude of the budget deficit.  It should go without saying that the right thing to do here is for all the unions to simply agree to a wage freeze for FY 2010 immediately and render this issue moot.