For the last few weeks, I’ve been telling everyone who will listen that we will be passing the state budget by April 1, and we want to do it with a two-thirds vote in both houses. Not everyone seems to believe this, so I say it again – a budget by the end of this month, with everyone participating.

Senate President Bev Daggett, with whom I talk daily, shares the same goal. She too wants to get it done. And Gov. Baldacci agrees with us. It’s time to get the economy moving, he says, and the best way to do that is finish the budget and roll out a bond package and economic development plan.

We face perhaps the most difficult budget decisions we’ve had in decades. The governor has pledged not to seek new taxes to make up a $1.2 billion shortfall, and we support him. But it means that we will have to make serious reductions in many state programs, and we can’t provide all the local school aid and other assistance we normally send to towns and cities. In many state departments, job cuts will make it a real struggle to maintain services.

There are many people who depend on state programs who can’t quite believe we have to make these cuts. They hope that by delaying, things will somehow get brighter or we’ll find more money. But by delaying, things only get worse. Instead, House Chairman Joe Brannigan and all the members of the Appropriations Committee will be working many late nights to finish on time.

We first passed an early budget six years ago under House Speaker Libby Mitchell, and we’ve done so ever since. Back then, one of the things I never expected was to hear from school superintendents and town managers who were grateful – truly grateful – that we’d given them budget numbers when they needed them. Since then, we’ve continued to pass early budgets, most of them by two-thirds.

State aid is so important to most communities that they don’t want to make major decisions – such as hiring or laying off employees – until the Legislature has passed the state budget. We owe it to those local officials, who will be making many tough decisions of their own, to pass our budget and let them do their jobs.

There have been years when legislators continued to haggle over the Part 1 budget, which funds continuing programs, well into June. Once, in July 1991, the state shut down because the budget had been tied to workers’ compensation reform. That’s a terrible way to govern, and we won’t let it happen again.

By delaying, by letting uncertainties grow, we do no one any favors. This budget is filled with painful and difficult decisions, but we’re kidding ourselves if we think it will be any easier in June than it is in March. No budget is ever the last word on state spending. We’ve had two supplemental budgets since the Legislature adjourned last April, and we may have more before the next session in January. But we need a basic spending plan for the state, and we need it now.

My message to my Republican colleagues is the same as what I tell members of my own Democratic caucus. If you can find a better way to do what was proposed in the governor’s budget, tell us about it and we’ll try to make it work. The governor has been open to suggestions, and we’re working on numerous changes. The bottom line, though, is that we can’t spend more money than what the governor’s budget sets out. The job hasn’t gotten any easier, but we can still respond to public needs.

Maine has an unusual budget process. In Congress and almost all other states, it takes just a majority to pass a budget. Because of our constitution, which requires a 90-day wait for legislation to take effect, we have to act by April 1 or pass the budget as emergency legislation, which requires two-thirds. This year, we especially need an early budget, and it would be great to have two-thirds of the Legislature behind it. It will say a lot to the people of Maine that we were able to take on a particularly daunting task, and do it together.

If we act now, we give ourselves time to work on other important legislation in the remaining weeks before adjournment. Tax reform, health care reform and economic development are at the top of the agenda, and there are many other important bills that deserve our time and attention.

Once we get the budget passed, we will have time to do the important work that still lies ahead. We can help put Maine on track to a better future, where the harsh winter of 2003 is only a memory, and not a continuing reality.

Pat Colwell is speaker of the Maine House of Representatives. He represents District 91 in the Gardiner area, and also served as House Majority Leader.