Democrats may push through Maine budget without GOP

AUGUSTA – Even as the Appropriations Committee prepares to take up the governor’s $109 million supplemental spending package today, House and Senate leaders were preparing for the possibility of pushing a Democratic majority budget through the Legislature leaving dissenting Republicans on the sidelines.

Republicans in the House and Senate have made no attempt to conceal their opposition to the Baldacci budget that increases Medicaid co-payment costs to the Drugs for the Elderly program and reduces reimbursements to health care providers, hospitals and pharmacists. Democrats, many of whom are also unhappy with the budget, are equally concerned about the need to avert a budget crisis for Democratic Gov. John E. Baldacci.

Adding to the overall tension of the budget process is the need to enact many of the cost-saving measures before the beginning of the last quarter of the current fiscal year, which ends June 30. Baldacci had hoped to address the timetable issue by appealing for two-thirds support in the Legislature to allow the bill to become law with his signature.

If it appears, however, that two-thirds support is not even possible in the Appropriations Committee, the administration may be forced to endorse a majority budget that could be passed by Democrats in the House and Senate before the end of January.

If that happens, then the majority leaders in the House and Senate would adjourn the Legislature for the purposes of allowing the budget bill to become law 90 days later, as prescribed under the Maine Constitution. Baldacci would then call the Legislature back into special session to deal with all remaining issues.

The political maneuver is not without precedent. In the past decade, two budgets have been determined by Democratic majorities whose leaders also agreed to waive the additional pay that lawmakers are entitled to in a special session.

Sen. Mary Cathcart, D-Orono, and Rep. Joseph Brannigan, D-Portland, co-chairs of the Appropriations Committee, and House Speaker Patrick Colwell, D-Gardiner, and Senate President Beverly Daggett, D-Augusta, met with Baldacci on Wednesday afternoon to discuss the supplemental budget.

After the meeting, Daggett said “the bottom line” of the entire Appropriations Committee process was to get a budget onto the floor of the Legislature that will balance state finances before the end of the fiscal year.

“Nothing has been settled, but a majority budget certainly hasn’t been ruled out,” she said. “We’ve done it before and the standard has been established.”

House Republican leader Joe Bruno of Raymond said there could be serious consequences for advancing a budget without GOP approval.

“The mere discussion of a majority budget before anything has been negotiated sends a horrible message about this institution,” Bruno said, adding that Colwell and Daggett will have to “strong-arm” many rank and file Democrats to get them to vote for a budget they oppose.

“The administration is telling us ‘it’s either my way or the highway’ as far as the budget goes,” Bruno said. “Democrats are not acting like a co-equal branch of government if they’re just going to do what the governor says. They’re not living up to their responsibilities as legislators if they’re not going to question what the governor is doing simply to put the legislative stamp of approval on this.”

Lee Umphrey, the governor’s communications director, said the budget was “challenging,” but that the nuances of the process – such as a majority budget versus a two-thirds budget – were less important to the governor than the goal.

“People are going to have to share the pain, and the governor just wants to get this done,” Umphrey said. “He hopes that everybody will work together to do what’s in the best interests of all people.”

Administration staffers and Democratic lawmakers have dismissed much of the Republican saber rattling over the budget as a warm-up for the November elections when both the House and Senate are up for grabs. Bruno, who will be a candidate for the Senate this fall, rejected that premise but warned that a majority budget could turn such speculation into a self-fulfilling prophecy.

“Once you go down this path of a majority budget, it means Republicans and Democrats cannot work together and there will be no incentive to work together on anything,” he said. “Then it really becomes political and the campaigns will have already started.”