A Calamity is Coming
The budget picture keeps getting more grim every day, and you have Maryland Democrats and their Teacher’s Union overlords to thank for it:
The cost of implementing the Blueprint is projected to grow from $1.6 billion in fiscal year 2024 to $4.1 billion five years later, according to the Department of Legislative Services. Meantime, the state’s structural budget gap is set to balloon every year through 2029 — when Legislative Services expects it to be $2.9 billion and the Moore administration says it will be about $3.5 billion.
Democrats keep talking a good game about not wanting to raise taxes (beyond what they’ve already proposed, of course) but the real proof is buried deep in the above article. Delegate Ben Barnes spoke the quiet part out loud.
Del. Ben Barnes, a Democrat who chairs the Appropriations Committee, said legislators should start talking about a long-term payment plan for the Blueprint now. The shared values between the legislature and the governor will bring them together, Barnes said, to solve the Blueprint budget dilemma.
“This legislature, the governor, we share values, and those shared values include all the priorities of the Blueprint,” Barnes said. “Getting to children who live in communities of poverty, taking care of special needs students, I mean, these are what we all ran on. And so I feel confident we’ll find the revenue we need to support that program.”
Read between the lines and you will understand that “I feel confident we’ll find the revenue” is Barnes hinting at tax increases. If not this year, next year.
It’s amazing how quickly
Maryland’s pendulum swung from the budget surpluses of the Hogan years to the return of structural deficits of the Moore Years.
But it’s also just as predictable. As a tableau rosa with no experience and no policy chops, Governor Wes Moore was always in danger of being railroaded by legislative Democrats and the Maryland State Education Association. The MSEA, particularly, has a vested interest in this They put him in office, and they have every reason to keep him there so they can funnel more taxpayer dollars into their pockets from union dues increases see education spending increased.
Wes Moore’s FY 2025 budget shows that pain is coming. The insistence on a fully funded Kirwan Commission plan shows us that pain is coming. And save for a few voices in the Republican caucus, few people seem all that interested in stopping in.
A calamity is coming…..