Government must cut back

As Louisiana continues to grow in spite of the effects of the national recession, how our state government spends taxpayer money is more important now than ever before. The budget we recently proposed for the 2012 fiscal year reduces the size of government so the state is living within its means while also protecting higher education funding, K-12 education funding and health care funding – all without raising taxes.

In the upcoming legislative session to pass this state budget, we know there will be those who say we need to cut more and there will be those who say we need to cut less. There will be those who do not want to see one single government job or program lost. They will be the ones who want to raise taxes. We have already seen ideas about hospital taxes, increasing taxes on natural gas drilling, raising income and gasoline taxes, and maybe we will even have a Twinkie tax before the legislative session is over. The bottom line is that we will fight against all these tax increases because we must fight to protect our growing economy.

We know many families are still hurting and struggling through tough economic times. Adding to their financial burdens by raising taxes would be one of the worst things we could do. We must ensure Louisiana is a land of tremendous opportunity so no one has to leave our state to pursue their dreams. That is why we have proposed a budget that right-sizes state government to a more sustainable size so we can serve our people better while keeping our economy growing and creating jobs.

Instead of raising taxes on Louisiana families, this budget will cut government through department-by-department strategic reductions for an estimated savings of around $410 million. This budget also reduces 4,000 government positions for a savings of $96 million. In total, our 2012 proposed budget represents a decrease of $1.1 billion or more than four percent of the previous year’s state budget.

Reducing state spending so we are living within our means allows us to protect funding for critical resources like education and health care. In K-12 education, for example, MFP funding has actually increased by 6.2 percent, from $3.12 billion in 2008 to $3.31 billion in 2011. Similarly, this budget protects our higher education institutions from any reductions in funding while also proposing no cuts to private Medicaid provider rates or reductions in eligibility or elimination of Medicaid services to protect access to health care programs for our people.

In addition to protecting critical services in education and health care, the 2012 budget we proposed takes the important step of reducing the use of one-time money. The amount of one-time revenue used for recurring expenditures in the recently proposed budget is more than $1 billion less than the amount used in the current fiscal year.

Why is reducing government spending while protecting critical services without raising taxes on our people so important? The answer is simple, we must protect our growing economy. Louisiana has continued its strong path of job creation and economic development throughout the national recession and even since the beginning of 2011.

I recently joined the Kennedy Rice Dryers to break ground on a new rice mill in Mer Rouge. The project will add to the small number of rice mills from Arkansas to I-10, and will process 30 to 40 percent of the region’s crop, so we keep more jobs and revenue in Louisiana.

This project also means the area impacted by the International Paper plant closure will see 22 new direct jobs, 85 indirect jobs and 50 construction jobs created.

On the other side of Louisiana, we just announced IFG Port Holdings LLC will build a new state-of-the-art export grain terminal in Lake Charles, creating more than 50 direct and indirect jobs and 200 construction jobs. The terminal will handle a number of Louisiana crops for export to other countries.

Both of these 2011 economic wins mean more infrastructure for our Louisiana farmers to help expand their businesses and more opportunities for our citizens to find a job and pursue the career of their dreams.

I want every Louisianian to know that when the Legislature comes into session later this month, we will fight against any and all attempts to raise your taxes.

When times are tough, government, not you, should be forced to cut back. My continued commitment to you is that we will make the hard decisions to force government to do more with less so that we can keep our economy on the path to prosperity throughout this year and for years to come.