Holmquist talks state deficit with Big Bend EDC

Senator calls for leadership change in Olympia

COLUMBIA BASIN - Sen. Jan/éa Holmquist, R-13th Legislative District, believes the Legislature faces a bit of a pickle barrel.

So Holmquist said Wednesday as she spoke before the Big Bend Economic Development Council monthly board meeting.

"It's real important that the board have an understanding," council Executive Director Michael Buchanan explained. "The state is a big part of how our economy runs, everything from the effects of (business and occupation) tax to programs costing business and making it more difficult to do business in the state."

Each person on the board representing Grant, Adams and Lincoln counties is concerned about the health of business, and believes business and jobs are the way to resolve issues of poverty and lack of educational opportunity, Buchanan said.

"We talk to our own membership, and we help (Holmquist) if she has to get word out," he said. "We're that conduit. We respond to her, we ask her to represent those issues important to us. We work together. I think every economic development council or every chamber, we talk to our legislators."

In speaking with the board, Holmquist covered a wide range of topics, primarily her concern that Gov. Chris Gregoire and the Democrat majority in the state Legislature have turned a record surplus "in one fell swoop" into a record deficit.

"It's not a revenue problem," Holmquist said, pointing to a boom in housing, construction and consumer spending triggered by President George W. Bush's tax cuts and low interest rates and an uptick in revenue growth which began in late 2004. These moves put the state back on solid ground, she said, and led to positive forecasts.

"We could have spent a lot more and increased spending without getting us in the hole, and there's really no excuse for it," she said. "So it's a spending problem, it's not a revenue problem."

The state's spending growth rate is more than two times the rate of the revenue growth, Holmquist said.

"If you were in any business trying to spend like that, you wouldn't be in business very long," she said. "You've got to live within your means."

The people of Washington want accountability, spending restraint and tax relief, Holmquist noted, but will get a revised deficit up to $2.5 billion.

The overall spending is now up to $33.7 billion against an anticipated revenue of $32 billion, Holmquist said. In 2011 to 2013, the state will face a deficit of $5.4 billion, she said.

"Unless there's a change in leadership in Olympia, I have no faith at all they're going to prioritize, lay off state employees and live within their means," she said. "They're going to come after your wallets, increase your taxes and get more money to cover their spending. You can already see their creative ideas of creating new taxes, such as an emissions tax, an engine-size tax and it goes on."

Other topics Holmquist talked about included the record reserve, Democratic claims to budget-related questions and criticisms, state-funded children's health care and all-day kindergarten and the rainy-day fund.

But Holmquist foresees hope on the horizon, and said she plans to work full-throttle for a change at the top and support Republican gubernatorial candidate Dino Rossi.

"But boy have we got ourselves into a pickle barrel with our spending," she said. "I try my best to put myself in the shoes of my colleagues. They are there, most of them, Democrats as well, because they want to help people, but there's this weird disconnect between a healthy business climate, living within your means, priorities of government and being able to have the money to do what you want to help people provide those services."