Jan 5, 2009 7:01 pm US/Central
Leaders Gather To Search For Budget Solutions
(WCCO)
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Staring into the jaws of a nearly $5 billion state budget hole, Gov. Tim Pawlenty went to the well on Monday. He called together a "Government Reform Summit" to search for solutions.
CBS
Staring into the jaws of a nearly $5 billion state budget hole, Gov. Tim Pawlenty went to the well on Monday. He called together a "Government Reform Summit" to search for solutions.
The governor opened the session by saying, "interest groups, the stakeholders, legislators, I think, all understand that we can't take a 'business as usual' approach."
The gathering was anything but usual. As leaders from a wide array of professions, in health care, business, education and government, put their ideas at helping solve the budget crisis to paper. After an initial group gathering to hear from the governor and his budget director, the 40-member panel broke into four groups.
Retired University of St. Thomas professor, Fred Zimmerman, was assigned to the higher education panel.
"We've got to adjust to the realities that we have. We've got fewer jobs, less revenue. That's not going to change," Zimmerman contends.
Many ideas generated by the group will be controversial, such as those aimed at paring down the strain of health care costs and early retirement of public employees.
Zimmerman calls that a growing problem. Today's life expectancy is eight years beyond what it was in the 1960s.
"This has to be addressed arithmetically. There's no way that we're going to be able to generate the tax revenue in order to pay for people to retire in their mid-50s. It just won't work," he said.
Already, many smaller schools, towns and counties are sharing their services to help reduce cost. Services like fire protection, police, information technology and food services can be jointly administered. Minnesota could be seeing more of that as the pool of Local Government Aid continues to shrink.
Others who attended the summit revisited the notion of year 'round school. That idea is aimed largely at better utilizing public school buildings, which are under-utilized during three months over summer.
Yet, the biggest target remains the state's obligation to pay for health and human services costs. According to Pawlenty, those costs are rising by 20 percent each biennium.
He calls that a model for disaster, and said, "We cannot ultimately fix this problem unless we change that trajectory."
With consumer spending down and further job cuts expected, the state's 2010-2011 projected budget deficit may loom even larger. And in the minds of the 40 leaders gathered on Monday, it's a problem that will take far more than legislation to fix.
Mary Brainerd is the CEO of HealthPartners, one of the area's largest health care providers.
Brainerd welcomed the summit, and said, "We all know we've got a big problem with the state. And I think those of us in health care know that we need to be part of a solution. So having the chance to participate is really worthwhile from my perspective."
(© MMIX, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.)
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