Doyle: Stimulus money kept state from even deeper cuts

[undeterred]

By RICHARD MIAL | [e-mail]

A combination of “steep” cuts to state agencies and $2.2 billion in federal economic stimulus money helped to overcome a $6.6 billion budget deficit, Gov. Jim Doyle said Wednesday.

In an interview with the La Crosse Tribune editorial board, Doyle discussed the state budget that he had just signed on Monday. First, we had to make very deep and painful cuts,” Doyle said. “Most state agencies are being cut 8 to 10 percent. People will begin to see this in the next two years. There will be significant layoffs.”

Doyle called for eight furlough days a year, and the state has “rolled back” all scheduled non-union employee pay raises, and the unions have been asked to give up raises. “This is the largest cut in general tax revenue spending since the Depression — a 31/2 percent cut.”

Still, the budget actually increases spending by 6 percent — a fact that Republicans have pointed out. Doyle said those increases were the result of $2.2 billion in federal recovery act money, which also allowed cuts to local school districts to be less than they might have been.

“This is a 6 percent increase as a result of the federal stimulus money,” Doyle said. “We’re spending less Wisconsin taxpayer money than we did last time. ”He said that unlike some Republican governors, who vowed to refuse federal stimulus funds, “I’m going to try to get for the state every dime of stimulus money that I can.

“If it wasn’t for the federal stimulus act, we wouldn’t be cutting education by 2 percent,” he said. “We’d be cutting it by 12, 15 percent. We wouldn’t be talking about keeping our kids in health insurance. We’d be cutting all of that.”

He said the state has a staff of six or seven people whose job it is to track federal stimulus money. For instance, there will be $8 billion awarded nationwide for high-speed rail efforts. Wisconsin will ask for some of that money for high-speed service from Chicago to Milwaukee to Madison.

“In the Midwest, the corridor from Chicago to Madison is the most ready of any Midwest project,” he said. “We have done the engineering, we have done the environmental work. We own the right of way. Chicago to Milwaukee already is the most heavily used commuter rail off of either coast in the United States. It has a ridership that’s growing — last year at 24 percent. So there’s clearly a huge demand.”

http://www.lacrossetribune.com/articles/2009/07/02/news/01doyle02.txt

[midnight]

1. This is some good information. I'm looking forward to

that high-speed service between chicago and milwaukee to madison. I'm also greatful for how he is keeping our education system a priortiy and lessening the cuts to only 2% instead of the 12 or 15%.

[boomerbust]

2. High speed rail

Should be extended to Green Bay with stops along the lakeshore.