This won’t be a good year for promises

PACKET EDITORIAL, Jan. 14

By: Packet Editorial
   When Gov. James E. McGreevey delivers his second annual message to the Legislature and assembled dignitaries at the State House this afternoon, we presume he’ll be honest with his audience and acknowledge that the state of the state is not what it should be.
   Financially, the state is a mess. When he took office last year, Gov. McGreevey inherited a budget deficit that was far worse than his predecessor, acting Gov. Donald DiFrancesco, led him to believe. Not that this should have come as any surprise; historically, the first year of every gubernatorial administration is spent making up for the previous governor’s budget fabrications … er, projections.
   In 1970, Gov. William T. Cahill inherited a larger gap between state revenues and expenditures than Gov. Richard J. Hughes told him he would. In 1974, Gov. Brendan Byrne inherited a considerably larger gap than Gov. Cahill was projecting. In 1982, Gov. Tom Kean inherited a substantially wider gap than Gov. Byrne was predicting. In 1990, Gov. Jim Florio inherited a whopping gap compared to what Gov. Kean was reporting. In 1994, Gov. Christie Whitman actually inherited a more modest gap from Gov. Florio — but she promptly pushed through a series of tax cuts, allowing her to run up a tidy deficit of her own that she turned over to acting Gov. DiFrancesco, who passed it along, with an additional year’s worth of markup, to Gov. McGreevey.
   So in his first year, Gov. McGreevey tinkered with a few taxes (like cigarettes and corporate income) to boost revenues, made a few adjustments (like freezing state aid to schools and municipalities) to slow the growth in expenditures, and found just enough fiscal gimmicks (like restructuring debt, reformulating the value of pension funds and transferring assets among state agencies) to squeak by. In the coming year, however, with the national economy still sluggish and another multi-billion-dollar deficit looming, the governor may have to make some much tougher choices in order to raise enough revenue or cut spending to balance the state budget.
   And unlike the federal budget, which can (and, thanks to President Bush’s economic policies, undoubtedly will) operate at a deficit, the New Jersey Constitution requires that the state budget be balanced.
   If the economy continues to make Gov. McGreevey’s job difficult, so do other circumstances. He has tried to reform the Division of Motor Vehicles (last reformed, it may be recalled, by Gov. Whitman — and before her by Gov. Florio, and before him by Gov. Kean, and before him by Gov. Byrne) but to no avail; the Republicans, who hold 20 seats in the 40-member Senate, have effectively stymied this initiative. He wants to reinstate the Department of the Public Advocate (abolished, it may be recalled, by Gov. Whitman, after it was beefed up by Gov. Florio, after it was restructured by Gov. Kean, after it was created by Gov. Byrne), but there is very slow going on this front, in part because it is hard to countenance another department of state government when there’s no money.
   He reportedly wants to make auto-insurance reform a cornerstone of his second year in office (where have we heard that one before?) but in this densely populated state, where motorists travel more road miles per year — and, in almost linear proportion, run into each other more often — than in any other state in the union, it is hard to imagine a remedy that will succeed where all others before it have failed.
   It’s tough being governor when the cupboard is bare, the opposition party is sharpening its claws in a legislative election year and everything you want to do already has been done — or undone — by those who have gone before you. But as long as Gov. McGreevey is candid with us, doesn’t try to sugar-coat the condition of our state and refrains from insulting our intelligence by asking us to "do more with less," he’ll be forgiven if his annual message this year is longer on setting priorities than it is on making promises.