Tuesday, December 18, 2007

Kaine throws fiscal responsibility and budgetary restraint out the window.

On Monday Governor Tim Kaine unveiled his $78 billion, two-year spending plan for state government that includes no new taxes. This is the Governor's proposed budget for the 2008/2010 biennium.

Kaine claims the plan includes no tax increases, (as long as you don’t consider a $10 increase in the fee for a driver’s licenses a tax hike), however, what concerns me is the budget includes hundreds of millions of dollars in new spending initiatives that appear to be financed by overly optimistic revenue projections and billions of dollars in new debt.

In order to pay for increased spending the governor takes money out of the state's “rainy day” fund, and raids the Transportation Trust Fund. Seems odd to have to take money out of the rainy day fund, since it is not raining, the economy is not yet in recession.

As a Northern Virginian I am disappointed that the governor takes $180 million out of Transportation funding to pay for other things. Sadly transportation as been under funded for years, and with this budget Kaine has failed to address the problem.

The early reviews have not been good. We shall see how the legislature deals with the proposal.

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