Maine’s “Surplus”?
Imagine you just succeeded in cutting your household budget by thousands of dollars per month, and then found $20 in the cushions of your couch. What would you call that?
Luck? A gift? A miracle?
In the disconnected world of state financing, that’s called a “surplus”.
State revenue for March came in $26 million more than expected, which has some politicians and state officials elated. Perhaps they’ve forgotten Maine was just forced to close a billion dollar budget hole with enormously painful cuts, gimmicks, and one-time “stimulus” money from Washington.
Further, because the root causes of our fiscal mismanagement were not addressed during the legislative session, Maine will face another $1 billion budget hole next year.
Despite these cold hard facts, some want you to believe this represents a “surplus”.
This is the kind of political nonsense that confuses and frustrates Mainers. They are clamoring for competence.
At the very least, Mainers deserve someone to tell them the truth. State finances are a mess and no one is being held accountable.
That won’t happen in my administration. As Governor, I’ll appoint professional managers, not politicians, to run our departments and agencies, and hold them accountable for spending tax dollars wisely.
We can fix our fiscal, economic, and job-related problems. But it’s going to take someone with courage, who will be honest about what we face, and has the financial and private sector experience to address these issues directly.
The Right Experience for Maine’s Economic Challenges
If you woke up one morning to find your basement flooded by a broken water pipe, who would you call to fix it?
Most people would call a plumber. That’s basic commons sense. To fix a problem, you hire someone with the training, skills, and experience to competently address the solution.
You also might look for a proven record of success. Someone may have been trained to fix pipes and plumbing – they may even have the best intentions of stopping the leak - but that doesn’t necessarily mean they are any good at it.
As anyone who’s had to do home repairs knows, mistakes can be very costly and cause the problems to get much worse.
In Maine, we wake up each morning to find our budget flooded with deficits, overspending, gimmicks, and gross mismanagement of state resources. Cuts are made to programs with no regard to their overall success of failure. Tough reforms are pushed to future legislative sessions.
For decades, well-intended career politicians have had their opportunity to address Maine’s economic problems, but fundamental mistakes have been made and our problems are much worse.
Our next Governor must be someone with the training, skills, and experience to competently address our fiscal, economic, and job-related challenges. He or she should be someone with extensive experience in finance who understands the basics of how an economy works.
My entire professional life has been in the private sector, running, managing, and investing in businesses and creating jobs. I know the basics of finance and will make the tough decisions to ensure the long-term economic success of our state.
You wouldn’t hire a carpenter to do a plumber’s job – much less a career politician. It’s time to elect a competent manager to lead Maine.
Our Second TV Ad
I’m excited to announce that I released my second TV ad of our campaign. You can view it here.
With the election just a few weeks away, it’s more important than ever to keep our TV ads on the air.
Each $120 contribution, ensures that we will continue to tell Mainers about how important it is to elect someone with private sector experience. Our next Governor must have the background, skills and management experience to address Maine’s fiscal, economic, and job-related problems.
I hope I can count on your support to keep getting our message to the people.
Fiscal Mismanagement and Political Experience
As this year’s legislative session comes to a close, I am struck by the utter lack of any attempt to address Maine’s most pressing economic and fiscal problems.
The budget battle offered an opportunity to discuss fundamental questions about what state government should do and what we can afford. Instead, it deteriorated into a familiar fight over balancing the sides of a ledger.
Cut some here. Put more there. Borrow this. Gimmicks to fix that. Pass on the really tough decisions.
This is gross fiscal mismanagement at a time when every dollar counts.
Almost a quarter of all Mainers are enrolled in a program intended to help the truly needy afford health care. Though costs are clearly unsustainable, there was no attempt to reform this program to ensure its future solvency.
Maine taxpayers owe more than $8,000,000,000 in unfunded liabilities from just two programs, the State Employees’ Retirement Fund and their Retiree Health Plan. Instead of figuring out how we are going to afford the $700 million annual payments starting in 2015, some in Augusta thought it was more important to alarm citizens about the dangers of cell phones.
Even more immediate, our deficit is projected to be $1.2 billion in the next budget cycle. Rather than reduce the cost and complexity of doing business in Maine to create jobs and grow the private sector, our current Governor and majority in the Legislature are asking us to borrow more.
This is what political experience has brought us in Maine.
Again, I am struck by the inattention to our most pressing problems, but I am not surprised. Career politicians know how to use the political system to keep and maximize their own power.
It’s hard to stay a politician for more than a decade by consistently pointing out the dangers of overspending, high taxes, burdensome business regulations, and incompetent fiscal management. It’s best not to upset the status quo in their view.
But now Maine’s economy stands on the brink of collapse. We must immediately change course and address the fundamental failures of thirty years of fiscal mismanagement.
We need a courageous leader to do what’s right for Maine in the short-term to preserve prosperity in the long-term. Our next Governor must be a skilled manager from the private sector, with extensive experience in finance and economics, who will make the tough decisions without regard for the next election.
The politicians have had their shot and we’ve seen where that’s taken us.
It’s time for new management.
More Debt is the Wrong Choice
In defense of his $79 million bond package, the current Governor presents the taxpayers of Maine with a false choice:
“I know that among some there is concern about borrowing right now…but we cannot sit back and wait for the economy to improve. We must take appropriate action to make it happen.”
Of course, no one is suggesting we “sit back” and hope the economy improves on its own. But borrowing more money is not the only other option.
Instead, we need to make the tough call right now.
As the last budget crisis illustrated painfully, we’re broke. Maine has no additional money for infrastructure or any other program. Now some are predicting we will be more than $1 billion short next year.
Increasing debt is not the right solution. Short-term gains will be significantly outweighed by long-term losses unless we first address to cost and complexity of doing business in Maine.
To properly fund our most pressing priorities, our next Governor must focus on better managing state resources, controlling spending, reducing taxes and promoting a business friendly environment to grow our private sector economy.
We must begin the difficult process of evaluating what services we should provide and being honest about what we can afford. We need to end the cycle of mismanagement that causes budget deficits year-after-year.
Borrowing more money now is an easy answer that will make future choices more difficult. Our next Governor must be someone who understands that and has experience dealing with these deep fiscal and economic issues. It needs to be someone who can make the tough call now.
Tax Gimmicks and More Debt from Augusta
The referendum questions on the ballot this June represent a stark example of what we get after decades of mismanagement in state government.
Three of the referendum questions would allow Augusta to borrow almost $70,000,000 for “economic development,” infrastructure, and energy projects. Augusta has already borrowed upwards of $150,000,000 in recent years, and continues to carry a $8,000,000,000 unfunded liability on their books.
The fourth measure will ask voters to weigh in on a controversial tax shift passed by the Legislature last year.
Those in support of the tax change believe the effect will be “revenue neutral”, meaning they believe that Maine will collect the same amount in taxes even under the new system.
This is a primary reason why I favor repealing the law. Mainers are overtaxed and need real reform. Taking the same amount of money away from Mainers through a different mechanism is not reform.
Further, addressing tax reform without first addressing our spending problems is putting the cart before the horse. We can’t make in any meaningful tax changes until we fundamentally decide what services we should provide and what we can afford.
Once we learn to spend only what we take in, then we can reduce taxes across-the-board to put more money in the hands of our struggling families, and give businesses an incentive to invest in Maine.
The result will be more jobs for Mainers and a growing private sector for all industries. That’s a strategy for long-term prosperity.
The strategy put forth by our elected officials – tax shifting and more debt – is just more business-as-usual in Augusta and should be rejected.
Better Management for Maine Town Hall Tour
I’m excited to announce that I’ve scheduled a series of town hall-style events around the state. I’m spending the remaining days of the primary going directly to the people of Maine to hear what they expect of their next Governor. I hope you can attend the event near your area.
Skowhegan Read the Recap | Watch the Video
Apr 26, 2010
Skowhegan
Community Center,
Conference Room B
39 Poulin Drive, Skowhegan
Dover-Foxcroft Read the Recap | Watch the Video
Apr 27, 2010
Thompson Free Library
186 Main Street, Dover-Foxcroft
6:00 - 7:30 pm
Sanford-Springvale Read the Recap | Watch the Video
Apr 30, 2010
Nasson Community Center Little Theater
457 Main Street, Springvale
6:00 - 7:30 pm
Bath
May 1, 2010
Bath City Hall Auditorium
55 Front Street, Bath
2:00 - 3:30 pm
Augusta
May 3, 2010
Augusta Civic Center, Somerset Room
76 Community Drive, Augusta
6:00 - 7:30 pm
Rumford Read the Recap | Watch the Video
May 4, 2010
Rumford Public Library
56 Rumford Avenue, Rumford
6:00 - 7:30 pm
Auburn
May 10, 2010
American Legion Hall
71 South Main Street, Auburn
6:00 - 7:30 pm
York Watch the Video
May 14, 2010
Museums of Old York
207 York Street, York
6:00 - 7:30 pm
Waterville Read the Recap | Watch the Video
May 17, 2010
American Legion Hall
21 College Avenue, Waterville
6:00 - 7:30 pm
Bridgton Read the Recap | Watch the Video
May 18, 2010
Bridgton Community Center
15 Depot Street, Bridgton
6:00 - 7:30 pm
South Portland
May 21,2010
Italian Heritage Center, DaVinci Room
40 Westland Avenue, South Portland
6:00 - 7:30 pm
Rockland
May 24, 2010
VFW Post #2499
235 Park Street, Rockland
6:00 - 7:30 pm
Yarmouth
May 25, 2010
North Yarmouth Academy, Middle School Community Room
148 Main Street, Yarmouth
6:00 - 7:30 pm
Kennebunk
May 26, 2010
Kennebunk Free Library
112 Main Street, Kennebunk
6:00 - 7:30 pm
Gorham
May 31, 2010
Robie Gym
42 South Street, Gorham
6:00 - 7:30 pm
Additional Dates TBA
Maine Needs a New Manager
Maine’s economy inched closer to the economic abyss earlier this month when Standard and Poor’s, one of the major credit rating services, adjusted its outlook for Maine bonds from “stable” to “negative.”.
The significance is two-fold. One, it means the fiscal mismanagement going on in Augusta is sending harmful signals that Maine is amassing incredible debt and may not be able to meet its future obligations. Two, the ability of Maine to borrow in the future may be harder and more costly, adding untold sums to what we’ll force our children and grandchildren to pay off.
In short, the fiscal mess created by Augusta is no longer going unnoticed.
The reaction by some of our elected officials to the news that Maine is slipping off an economic cliff has been strange.
Our current Governor used the opportunity to praise political bipartisanship and pat his colleagues on the back for balancing the budget with gimmicks and lifelines from Washington.
“I think we hit it out of the park,” he said.
The weeks after Standard & Poor’s questions your future financial solvency is an interesting time to be cruising into a home run trot.
Maine is so poorly managed that we can’t pay our bills with money generated in the state. We’ve borrowed hundreds of millions of dollars from future generations, taken hundreds of millions more from Washington, emptied our reserves, and raided funds intended for other important needs like infrastructure.
And that’s all before we have to start addressing Maine’s next fiscal crisis – a $8 billion unfunded liability taxpayers owe to the State Employees’ Retirement Fund and its Retiree Health Plan.
Before politicians start gloating about home runs, they might want to look at the score. It’s the bottom of the ninth, and we’re still down by a lot. Maine’s baseball team needs a new manager.