Panel offers peek at state budget effort

OLYMPIA -- A House budget panel unveiled spending plans Wednesday for cleanup of Puget Sound, as well as for courts, parks, economic development, agriculture and state computer projects.

The rollout by the Appropriations subcommittee on general government and audit review offered the first peek at the majority Democrats' work so far on a new two-year state budget.

It's the first year of operations for House subcommittees on general government and education. They are spinoffs from the Appropriations Committee, and their recommendations will be influential as the full panel produces a new budget in mid-March, said veteran Appropriations Chairwoman Helen Sommers, D-Seattle. Before now, the full budget has been written by the committee, in consultation with the policy committee chairmen.

The full House budget is expected to be about $30 billion, roughly the same level proposed by Democratic Gov. Chris Gregoire.

The general government panel's plan for its slice of the budget also generally tracks with the governor's level.

It includes $1.47 billion in recommended spending, not including millions that will show up in a separate construction budget next month.

Highlights include:

Puget Sound: The panel recommends $11 million to create the Puget Sound Partnership, a new state agency that will oversee efforts to clean up the Sound by 2020. About $2 million would be used to engage residents in the effort. Overall, said Rep. Dave Upthegrove, D-Des Moines, the House supports the governor's effort to secure about $220 million from various sources, including toxics accounts and money from the federal government.

Judiciary: The subcommittee presumes that lawmakers agree with the governor's request that $55 million be trimmed from the court system's budget increase. But the panel also suggests $9 million to improve the public defender system, $6 million to enhance the Court Appointed Special Advocates program so that all 13,000 abused and neglected children in dependence cases get a guardian ad litem, and $4.8 million to improve civil legal aid for low-income families. Overall, the court system would get $275 million.

Economic development: The panel recommended $9 million to market Washington as a tourist destination, $5 million for local economic development councils, $500,000 to create an Office of Farmland Preservation, $1.9 million to help small forestland owners, $2.1 million to help small businesses cut through red tape, $1.2 million for local governments to streamline business permits and $695,000 to improve Small Business Development centers.

Parks: The committee endorses spending $4.2 million to reduce the maintenance backlog at state parks. That's part of a $137 million parks budget.

Legislature: Budget provides $160 million.

Governor: Proposal includes $16.7 million. The Budget Office would get $124 million.

Attorney General: The office would get $232 million.

Resource agencies: The Department of Natural Resources would get $96 million, Ecology $451 million, Fish and Wildlife $328 million and Agriculture $116 million.

The subcommittee chairwoman, Kelli Linville, D-Bellingham, said the panel accepted only $25 million of its colleagues' $165 million in new requests. The committee is still working on ways to trim spending on computer systems, lease overhead and other costs, hoping to free up money that can be used on direct services, she said.

The education panel is expected to release its plans Friday or next week.

The ranking Republican on Appropriations, Rep. Gary Alexander of Olympia, said he had few criticisms of the budget proposals, but said it's not clear how the committee's work will be folded into the main budget.

Alexander said it's a good idea to open up the budget-writing process more, as the subcommittees are doing.

The governor's budget director, Victor Moore, said the budget plan is very close to what Gregoire requested, within about $880,000.

"At first blush, we're in general agreement with them," he said, adding, "Anytime you can get this amount of scrutiny on the budget and involve the members, so much the better."

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