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No Quick Resolution Seen In Lottery And Budget Matters May 12, 2003
NASHVILLE - With the lottery in limbo and budget battles unresolved, legislative leaders who once spoke optimistically of an April adjournment are now trying to break a logjam that could linger until June.
The effort to end an impasse over the two major issues of the 2003 session will escalate this week. A myriad of lower-profile legislation is also in the hopper as normal rules are being suspended to set the stage for rapid action.
Passage of a state budget is the only duty Tennessee's Constitution imposes on the General Assembly. Budget bills are scheduled for votes in Finance Committees of both the House and Senate Tuesday, and, if the two chambers could agree on major provisions, it is at least theoretically possible to wrap up the session by week's end.
But no one expects that to happen. Indeed, when House Speaker Jimmy Naifeh was asked during a floor session Thursday his projected time for ending the session, he replied, "Oh, about 5:35 p.m.," then pointedly refused to give a date, even when the question was repeated.
Others are suggesting that Memorial Day, May 26 - give or take a couple of days - is about the earliest that the weariness with the current quarreling - the "fatigue factor" - will overcome the penchant for posturing on outstanding issues.
The lottery
Lottery legislation has risen to the level of the budget in importance, politically if not constitutionally, and it is in such a tangle that some legislators are quietly fretting over the possibility that nothing will have passed when the fatigue factor reaches critical levels - and over who will be blamed it that happens.
There are two major bills in play, one an "implementation bill" that sets up the machinery for operating a lottery. The House and Senate have passed sharply contrasting versions of that measure, and a conference committee likely will be set up this week to undertake the tedious task of trying to iron out differences.
The other big piece of lottery legislation is the "scholarship bill," which lays out procedures for using lottery profits to provide college scholarships. The Senate has passed its version, but the House scholarship bill is stuck in a subcommittee that meets again today.
The working House bill already had multiple and major contrasts with the Senate version, but an overhaul proposed by Rep. Harry Tindell, D-Knoxville, and supported by House Democratic leadership would make the differences even more dramatic.
A centerpiece of Tindell's proposal would provide scholarships retroactively to anyone with a 3.0 grade point average in his or her freshman college year - an idea attacked by Sen. Steve Cohen, D-Memphis, lead sponsor of lottery legislation.
Then there is the matter of timing and partisanship. Senate Republican Caucus Chairman Ron Ramsey of Blountville has flatly declared that his GOP colleges will not vote for a final implementation bill - even if a conference committee produces one - until after the scholarship bill is adopted.
Ramsey says there are "rumors" that the Democratic House leadership may leave the scholarship bill stranded in committee, while pressing ahead with the implementation bill that would allow lottery ticket sales to begin.
Naifeh denied any such intent, but also refused to commit to seeing a scholarship bill brought to a House floor vote, saying only: "We want to. It's our desire. We're going to try."
Democrat Cohen, who as sponsor has considerable control over scheduling any future Senate floor votes, said he sympathizes with the Republican scholarship-first stance and that the implementation bill cannot pass without GOP votes.
The budget
On the budget front, there are also two major bills in play, but the overtones are urban vs. rural as well as Republican vs. Democrat.
One is the actual $21.5 billion spending plan. The other is the "omnibus bill" - often corrupted to "ominous bill" in legislator and lobbyist commentary - that makes a hodgepodge of changes in revenue statutes necessary to put the $21.5 billion state budget together in the manner Bredesen envisions.
The most controversial provisions revise distribution of various "state-shared taxes" so that 9 percent of the funds normally sent to city and county governments - about $61 million - remain instead in state coffers.
In the Senate, the bipartisan duo of Sens. Bill Clabough, R-Maryville, and Jerry Cooper, D-McMinnville, has worked to eliminate the cut to state subsidies of local government, with Lt. Gov. John Wilder showing much sympathy for the effort.
Clabough was solidly supported last week by fellow Republicans on the Senate Finance Committee in an effort to delete the state-shared tax provisions from the omnibus bill, but Democrats lined up against the effort and a Bredesen-blessed version was sent to the Senate floor.
The battle is certain to be renewed there - though perhaps not until next week - and the outcome is much in doubt. Some suspect that Democrat defections under pressure from city-county lobbying could give Republicans the edge.
A key question is where to make up the $61 million. Clabough has suggested deeper cuts in state government spending - perhaps 10 percent in most areas instead of the 9 percent envisioned by Bredesen - plus chopping the TennCare budget by $30 million.
In the House, Rinks has led other rural legislators in an effort to change Bredesen's 9 percent cut in virtually all state-shared taxes to taking 100 percent of local Hall income tax revenues, leaving the others untouched.
The Hall tax is levied on stock and bond dividends and interest, and the local share goes to the hometown of each taxpayer. Thus, large cities and small towns that are homes to wealthy investors get a disproportionate share. The Rinks plan would leave the flow of state tax dollars to many rural areas unscathed.
· After a compromise was negotiated, legislation that effectively gives legislative blessing to creation of a "preferred-drug list" by Bredesen appears headed for passage.
Bredesen has said he welcomed the bill as an indication of legislative support in standing up to the pharmacy lobby, though it is legally unnecessary. The preferred-drug list, which will limit the brands of drugs available through TennCare, is projected to save the state health program anywhere from $70 million to $150 million once fully implemented.
· A bill prohibiting "predatory lending," opposed by the much of the lending lobby, is scheduled for a hearing in Senate Commerce Committee this week, but any action on the companion House bill has been deferred until next year.
Alternate bills with considerable lending industry support - and opposition from those who contend unwary consumers are being victimized by some practices in the home loan industry - are scheduled for committee votes this week.
· A bill that would require audits of the University of Tennessee Foundation, though leaving it exempt from many state laws that apply to UT itself, has cleared committee in the Senate and is scheduled for its first House committee vote this week. With UT officials voicing no objections to the modified measure, it appears likely to pass.
· Legislation aimed at preventing illegal immigrants from obtaining a Tennessee driver's license remains stalled in committees of both the House and Senate and appears likely to fail as did similar legislation last year - - though sponsors are still pushing it.
Similarly, legislation that would exempt adults from the state law that
requires motorcyclists to wear helmets - defeated annually for several
years - remains stalled though not abandoned by its sponsors.
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