Arkansas Senate Report: Spending cuts and redistricting

Editor’s note: Arkansas Sen. Jake Files, R-Fort Smith, provided the following commentary on the previous week of the 88th Arkansas General Assembly.

The best way to describe the momentum of a Legislative Session is to compare it to a large locomotive. It starts slow, picks up speed, and then it is difficult to catch and takes tremendous resistance to stop. We have completed two weeks in the 88th General Assembly, and we are starting to pick up speed.

Except for the snow and inclement weather, there has been precious little going on.  However, a couple of items made headlines this week, and I think will be in the undertones of the entire Session.

SPENDING CUTS
The way the appropriation process works is quite simple. The Joint Budget Committee passes the appropriation and then it goes to both Chambers for final approval. This determines how your tax dollars are spent. As you can imagine, there are times when items are “slipped” in or disguised as other expenditures, but there are also many items that are just what they seem — yearly budgets getting approved for spending and allocated monies.

This year, when the judge and prosecutor salaries bill came up for a vote in Joint Budget, a House member stood up to ask questions, specifically about the 1.86 percent raise for salaries in the bill. (As a side note, the bills already had come through freezing the salaries of all Constitutional Officers and Legislators, which was the right thing to do in this economic time). The bill was immediately pulled down and amended to freeze the salaries of the judges and prosecutors.

This was significant on a couple of fronts. First, it signaled a mood in the Committee (and in the Capitol) that we are looking at every dollar, and it would be irresponsible to give some raises and others not in a time when our economy has been posting negative performance numbers.

Second, it was the first representation of the two-party system as it came to legislating. Questions were raised and things were changed as much out of a realization that more votes were needed on the bill to pass, and there were more conservative members than not (regardless of party affiliation).

It will be interesting to see how this dynamic continues to play itself out. I know personally there have been many conversations about the real problem with the growth of state government being the increase in spending over the past 10-15 years under Governors of both parties. That simply has to be contained, and you should see more evidence of this in both rhetoric and policy in days ahead.

REDISTRICTING
The other interesting topic of the week was the discussion of redistricting and the timing needed to undertake this task. A quick background is that every 10 years when the Census is taken, the Federal Government gives us the information on how many voters/citizens we have, and then we, as State Government, are given the task of making sure these congressional (and legislative) districts are equitable as it relates to one-person, one-vote as mandated by our Constitution.

Our Constitution states that this must be completed by Feb 1, which is impossible as we do not get all the data from the Feds until mid-February. The discussion began this week focused on timing and how best to accomplish this task in an equitable time frame.

There was some wisdom which stated we can’t rush this and it would be October, or even next February, before this was completed. On the other side was a prevailing thought that we needed to honor the Constitution and get this completed in a responsible way, but more quickly than 9-12 months.

Once again, the dynamic of a more true two-party system was in play, and individual member districts should be decided before this Legislature adjourns. There is much less chance of gerrymandering (where districts are drawn to fit and reward the reigning party), and much more chance of getting representative districts if the process works itself out sooner rather than later.

On a personal note, I am always available by email or phone if constituents want to reach me about an issue or problem that they have with state government. I have several bills drafted that I intend to file in the coming weeks, and I am always available to discuss and hopefully help those who need assistance.

It is an honor to be able to serve, and my contact information is found on my website.