Budgeting for Alaska's future

     I played baseball when I was a kid--I took the field with a Nelly Fox glove and tight pants that ended just below the knees where long stirrup stockings connected the pants to supple black leather shoes with rubber cleats.
     That was a long time ago. Chicago infielder Nelly Fox lingers only in the minds of baseball fans above the age of 50 and most players' pants now go all the way to their Nikes.
     Back then, like now, we also had our field chatter. "Hey, batta, hey batta" and "pitcher's got a rubba arm" were institutionalized chants we thought intimidated batters or rattled pitchers. Those and other rote chants took us far beyond any of the cerebral elements of one of America's top two pastimes.
     The other American pastime, politics, also has its chatter that gets in the way of any cerebral approach to policy. Usually, political chatter is more articulate, we hardly ever drop the consonants, and our chatter is usually thinly veiled in a gauzy politeness.
     But gauzy politeness gave way to the more basic "hey, batta" thoughtlessness just before and just after the governor vetoed many capital budget projects funded by the legislature. In the run-up to her vetoes, she noted she needed to be the "adult in the house". After her vetoes, I noted, along with many of my colleagues, she:

• was absent from the legislative process on the capital budget during the 2007 session and did not articulate her budget criteria when staff testified before the finance committees in public hearings; and
• after defining her criteria post-session, did not always follow her criteria recipe as she decided what projects were cut and what projects were left in.

     Her pre-veto rhetoric and our post-veto responses were not helpful. To be blunt, we could have done 'way betta' with the 'hey batta' talk.
     Circumstances have changed so we do have an opportunity to do better.
     First, last year, we had a new governor and a new legislature but this coming session we start with a budget that is hers entirely, not something she uncomfortably inherited from her predecessor. For our part, we must insist on engagement from the governor and her staff as we work with community, business and government leaders in the budget committee process. Her views must be part of the mix as the budget is vetted by community leaders, legislators and the public through the public hearing process not after the session is adjourned.
     Second, I believe we can get beyond last session's budget travails because the recent special session trained us in success. During that special session, the legislature took her proposed oil tax and it evolved dramatically through the course of focused public committee hearings. Throughout the special session, her staff was fully engaged in the details.
     Working together during that hectic but productive 30-day session, we made dramatic changes to her proposal that: worked for her; worked for the majority of legislators; and, more importantly, worked for Alaskans. During the budget debates during the upcoming 90-day session, we can do the same--melding her views, the collective will of the legislature, and the views of community leaders and Alaskans from all regions of the state into budget packages that work for everyone.
     The alternative is what happened last year--a process that devolved to the level of chin music. In baseball, chin music is a pitch thrown at the batter's head. In policy debates, chin music is when we argue in a way that divides instead of unites. When discussing policy, whether in the executive branch or the legislative branch, our chin music paradigm needs to be Gershwin instead of a series of bean balls.