Gov. Butch Otter put on a show for the TV cameras Tuesday — and put some pressure on lawmakers on the fence about his transportation initiative.
Otter surrounded himself with supporters for a rally/news conference on the steps of the old Ada County courthouse. He was joined by a crowd of advocates for transportation, new Lt. Gov. Brad Little, a host of Republican legislative leaders — and a couple of Democratic mayors, Boise's Dave Bieter and Pocatello's Roger Chase.
Otter is off to a better start than a year ago, when he introduced a bill to raise vehicle registration fees with little fanfare — and with no chance of passage. This year, Otter has an impressive array of allies. The question is whether he can cobble together an unlikely Statehouse coalition.
Otter needs support from conservative Republican leaders, and from the Democratic minority. Otherwise, his $174 million plan — which includes increased gas taxes and vehicle registration fees — is as good as dead.
Otter's transportation bills were introduced Tuesday. The unanimous, bipartisan vote in the House Transportation and Defense Committee was a formality; a governor's bills are traditionally introduced out of courtesy. But the tone of Tuesday's committee hearing foreshadowed some of the challenges ahead.
Committee chair JoAn Wood, R-Rigby, did little to hide her skepticism. She pointedly said her committee members had been given little time to review the bills — and would have more questions later. She also said lawmakers would have some 15 competing bills of their own.
When Otter’s bills return to committee, we’ll soon see whether he has legislative leadership on his side. Two members of GOP leadership sit in Wood’s committee: Assistant Majority Leader Scott Bedke of Oakley and Caucus Chairman Ken Roberts of Donnelly.
While Democrats have only four of 15 votes in committee, and 18 of the House’s 70 seats, their influence outweighs their numbers. In a recession, conservative Republicans are going to want to hold the line on any tax and fee increases — so Otter needs the Democrats.
“I hope I get both parties to pass something,” Otter said Tuesday. Of course he does; it’s his only hope.
In Tuesday’s hearing, Boise Democratic Rep. Phylis King made a brief but telling observation. She said she wished Otter had brought in a sixth transportation bill — one allowing voter-approved local-option sales taxes for roads or public transit. If Otter wants some Democrats on his side, he may need to support them on local option.
Then again, it may be too late. Democrats have staked out a hard line on transportation, accusing Otter of putting potholes ahead of people. And I think Otter has made it comfortable for Democrats to stick to this line — and play the loyal opposition, much like congressional Republicans have resisted President Obama’s economic stimulus plan.
The difference is, Otter needs more Democratic votes than Obama needs Republican votes.
With Bieter and Chase on his side, Otter is starting to lean on the Democrats, but it’s subtle pressure.
If Otter wants to play hardball, he may want to take a cue from a predecessor, Cecil Andrus. In the mid-1980s, when the Democratic governor and the Republican Legislature were at odds over public school funding, Andrus would hit the road to cities such as Idaho Falls, and call out — by name — legislators who opposed his school budget. Eventually, Republicans blinked.
This may not be Otter’s style, and there is some risk to naming names.
Fresh off shoulder surgery, Otter isn’t in physical condition to twist arms — at least literally. But if he wants to get anywhere on the transportation issue, he’ll need to do a lot of pitching and persuading, across party lines.
Click here for Dan Popkey’s story.
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Good read
You're seeing what I'm seeing. But I think you're misreading the Democrat's "hard line". They staked out a position on Republican's odd sense of priorities in a lean budget year, raising taxes for transportation but cutting education. Democrats want to be part of the solution on roads but they don't wanna sacrifice Idaho's greatest resource at the same time.
Is that "spuds" or "spuds"?
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To read is wonderful. To comprehend art. Falling back to whatever you believed in is NORMAL.
education
I have not personally reviewed the budget for education, but there is ample evidence that simply throwing money at education is not productive. Neither is throwing money at our inefficient transportation department.
Huh?
Clearly you haven't. Cause they aren't "throwing money" at it. They're cutting it for the first time in history.
I haven't been in a coma
And every dollar being spent is for educating our children and grand children and none of it on a study of the mating habits of the green goofus bug.
They eat aphids, don't they? They NEED to mate.
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To read is wonderful. To comprehend art. Falling back to whatever you believed in is NORMAL.
Sis
Sisyphus, I see throwing money at education on a regular basis. It's called poor management.
My kids come home and tell me about their day 'of school' at the movie theater- since the whole 'team' had a sufficient GPA. Or "we watched a movie in class because 'the teacher couldn't fix the computer server'". I hear of teachers that will not work ANY extra time that is not spelled out in their union contract. Now Boise likes to "Start Late" so teachers can plan more. I see expensive schools being built and money wasted in high maintenance landscapes. I see expensive touch screen projector in high school math classes filled with students not able to do basic math.
We'll all see this more when the new schools open next year.
And of course we can talk about all the administrators in our 126 school districts. In addition to the superindentant, Boise School District has a "Director" for each high school. A principal AND a director??? Boise High has 3 vice principals; Capital has 3; Borah has 3; Timberline squeaks by with 2. That's an awful lot of FULL_TIME professionals charged with managing 4 high schools. And there's a lot of teacher experience moving out of the class room in favor of easier admin jobs with higher salaries.
BSD has an Executive Director of Operations and one of his responsiblities is District Safety and Security. Then ALSO a job responsibility of each High School Director is "School Safety". That's a lot of safety going on. Yet, kids crossing the street at Boise High (& East Junior High) in the morning are risking their lives, without any adults guiding the chaos and with terrible street parking blocking kids' views.
BSD's strategic goal is All students meet high standards of performance in learning. That's a "goal"? Someone in the District needs to learn how to set measurable and attainable goals. Here's the analogy, Coach Pete's goal next year is for the Broncos to 'meet high standards of performance'.
if you want some good reading: http://www.boiseschools.org/business/accounting/budget/index.html
Then this is just ONE district, you would have to review the budgets of ALL of them to get the full picture. I doubt anyone has done that.
Do we need to talk about all the levels of beauracracy at the State Dept of Education?
It's foolish to pretend our representatives have children
in mind when the same representatives are spending trillions of $ fixing the problem they created through campaign finance which is still driving the problem. $53 trillion & counting, they are putting the same children further in the red every second.
The crooks in banking & Wall Street contributed $64 million to our representatives so the SEC would look the other way, made out like a bandit for years & drove our economy to gound. They received billions, gave themselves billions in bonuses, & received billions more. This crooked banking has been going on for a half century & I have bank records to prove it. The banking scandals of the eighties are proof in themself. When do we the people do something that resembles intelligence?
Now we're handing the crooks billions more & spending billions on infrastructure that would already be in place if politicians like Otter, Bush, Crapo, Risch, & a list perpetual who took contributor's money in return for tax cuts, would have been working for US taxpayers.
This is the crime of all time & the people are swallowing it hook, line, & sinker! Otter has some clown in charge of every scam in the state from alcohol to the Tax Commission. Now the broken down old texas ranger is going to raise gas taxes & registration fees on the poor?
I don't see why they would even let him address legislature, I'd be amazed if he weren't run out of the state.
Otter is no better than the Gov of Illinois, Blago whatever. We have Larry Craig, Otter, Minnick a republcian in demcorat's skin, Risch, an obvious pocket puppet, & who am I forgetting? Idaho has quite a list of scandals the last eight years I've lived here. Illinois is starting to look respectable compared to Idaho.
Our representatives in DC are all over the peanut producer who is responsible for salmonella. That guy sent samples from one lab to the next until he got the passing grade.
When I reported unsanitary transportation & warehousing at Darigold in Idaho, the sixth largest dairy in the nation, I was fired? Otter had some flunky send a letter suggesting inspections were done. Why would I send pictures of obviously unsanitary conditions, not cleaned up in years, to the USDA, who Otter's flunky said does inspections, if they do inspections? How often do they do inspections? Every ten years?
Maybe the same representatives asking the peanut producer questions, need to ask Otter a few.
When milk is labeled hog food & rerun on the same pallet, is it? Darigold used to rerun milk just like the peanut producer, until they got results that sold for a profit. This in the highly subsidized dairy indusrty.
The people of Idaho mightwant to look at pictures on www.nextrevolution.net & call your representatives.
I doubt that happens. If you allow it, they will continue to rip you off. All the young men & women fighting Bush's $600 billion lie against terror, sacrificed for nothing & their families are being ripped off in return while contributors continue to make out like a banidit.
Still think Idaho's representatives or any other DC politicians care about kids or education?
By the way, WINCO private label milk used to be Darigold
milk so if anyone takes the time to look at pictures on Nextrev or has reservations about drinking Darigold milk, you might want to ask at WINCO before you buy.
Rarely care and I use powdered milk almost completely...
Exclusively for cooking.
PS Cows have no political backbone until part of their backbone gets in the hamburger.
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To read is wonderful. To comprehend art. Falling back to whatever you believed in is NORMAL.
You'd be even more concerned if you knew
about the powder. I forget how many billions of $, tax $ worth of powdered milk was in warehouses a few years ago. Subsidized, powder, tons, & tons, & tons of subsidized powdered milk, just sitting there. That's why they starte dthe war in iRaq, to give away the powdered milk.
Did you know they ship cheese across the country, melt it down, add whatever, new cheese, new name, yada, yada, yada. How can it be cost effective to ship it back & forth all day everyday? How much fuel do we use when it could just stay home?
They do the same thing with milk/milk, juices, pulp, & all that good stuff. Back & forth on your tax $.
The popcorn in those poppers too! SO? Am I DEAD...
Or Hank Williams?
Versatile crap, Ain't It?
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To read is wonderful. To comprehend art. Falling back to whatever you believed in is NORMAL.
When the hell have I seen government cheese in almost 20 years?
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To read is wonderful. To comprehend art. Falling back to whatever you believed in is NORMAL.
Budget Situation
You know, If we had intelligent representatives instead of putting bubble gum in the holes of a sinking ship like they have done this entire legislative session, you would think that with the deficit being so high, they would inventory and evaluate all of the current practices, come up with a vision for Idaho and a plan to restore the economy and then prioritize their budget accordingly.
Darcy, you are shortchanging your representatives.
They are very intelligent, making out like a bandit at taxpayer expense intelligent.
I don't undertand why people don't catch on or why we would expect it to stop when we won't do anything about the crime. Our representatives are just a piece of the puzzle, like accountants who write tax law & hand it to representatives to pass into law. The Idaho Tax Commission giving tax cuts to corporations who hire accountants heavy into tax knowledge & can't be bullied kind of intelligent. The same accountants! It's a shell game.
How can corporations lose & why would our representatives making $ do anything to stop it? It's a perfect crime with nobody but the people to answer to & we either don't get it or are afraid to stand up to the crooks?
Economic & financial experts paid as consultants by those representatives, experts on the payroll of the same corporations who hand $ to our representatives through campaign finance, & our represnettaives give it back ten fold, 100, or more.
Is it a surprise we're in this financial crisis & it isn't getting better, worse by the second? What advise do you suppose the experts gave our representatives?
Something like another $800 billion would sure help? They're all so crooked & involved it makes Madoof look like a saint. He was once the head of NASDAQ!
It's gotten so bad they can't stop bleeding US out. The current stimulus is just more of the same, the collapse of our economy won't quit because the foundation of democracy is deteriorated beyond repair through campaign finance.
We the People don't matter anymore, we're the most important part of their scam in that we pay for it all yet they're willing to kill the golden goose because they can't stop or the world will know. Their greed won't allow them to stop, they would have to admit their crime. Lies, that's how they work, have top keep lying.
Corporations, campaign finance, accountants, tax law, financial experts, stimulus, representatives, SEC, FED, Treasury, $64 million, economic experts, lawyers, judges, & they're all in it together. We the People are just here to pay for it while they all conspire to make bank! Why would they stop? We the People won't demand full finacial disclosure by all our representatives & their families.
How much $ did Madoff's wife take out of banks in the days before he confessed? Our representatives were telling US taxpayers we weren't in a reccession for a year & when they finally decided we were in a reccession we had been for a year?
How much $ did the working class lose in the market while experts & our representatives told US to stay in the market & where were they all vested for that year? Where did they move their money so as not to lose?
Does anybody think our representatives lost money in the market like the working class paying for this stimulus while the same represnetatives are handing out billions to the crooks? Agter accepting $64 millions so the SEC would look the other way?
Bush's team wouldn't alloow public debate. Chairman of the FED Greenspan, Treasury Secretary Rubin, & Chairman of the SEC Levitt shut down Brooksley Born, head of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, who testified 17 times before Congress in support of public debate about derivatives AIG was into so as top determine if they were a threat to the world finacial system.
Bush's top financial & economic experts wouldn't allow it! AIG suposedly had a computer simulation suggesting their plan was failsafe, fool proof, couldn't fail. What kind of scam would suggest selling houses at $300K to $500k to people making $50K a year wouldn't fail?
House that were overpriced to start with & lost value while property taxes on the rest of US went up with the value of these overpriced homes! We were all ripped off in that we're still paying property taxes on over valued homes & our representatives still don't have enough money for education so they added billion sin the stimulus?
This mess isn't going to get better until the working class demand some answers. The pieces of the puzzle are all there, put them toether & tell me what you see. It didn't happen overnight either. I have banking records from the sixties that led up to the banking scandals of the eighties. The banking scandals of the eighties lead up to this financial crisis. We never caught on so they continued until it got so out of hand they can't stop & we still aren't doing anything?
I recently read the Statesman is hurting & laying off. They might go to the boss & ask about doing an investigation so as to gain a little respect & sales to the working class. I have some bank records they might find interesting. I have twenty five years of history leading up to the banking scandals of the eighties which lead up to this. It would be like Watergate.
Why would the crooks stop ripping US off if we don't break the story? Would Nixon have resigned?
He probably would've worked himself into a coronary anyway.
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To read is wonderful. To comprehend art. Falling back to whatever you believed in is NORMAL.