Cheers and Jeers
Corey Taule and J. Robb Brady
January 15, 2010
Idaho Falls Post Register
Jeers to Gov. C.L. "Butch" Otter for his recommendation that the Idaho Department of Parks and Recreation be eliminated and management of state parks transferred to the Idaho Department of Lands.
Yes, we're in the midst of some serious budget cutting. But it appears that Otter's shop didn't do its homework on this one. Getting rid of the department that administers Idaho's 26 state parks could cost the state the crown jewel of its system, Harriman State Park.
Idaho's state park agency was created in 1965 for a very specific reason: Roland and Averell Harriman wanted to give Idaho their 11,000-acre "Railroad" ranch in Island Park. But first Idaho had to create an agency to manage its parks.
Otter's misstep on this one is difficult to understand. Prior to the Department of Parks and Recreation, Idaho administered its parks through the Department of Lands.
Clearly, that system wasn't good enough for the Harrimans. And for good reason. The Lands Department aims at profit, not land management. It's good at dealing with timber sales and grazing leases and not so good at making sure pristine places remain so.
In an Idaho Statesman story, a member of the Harriman clan is quoted as saying the family is upset at Otter's proposal and is considering its options. So, if Otter doesn't pull his proposal, or if legislators don't modify it, Idaho could end up losing a $50 million asset and its most popular and recognizable state park. All this to save $6 million a year.
It's time to go back to the drawing board on this one, governor.
Cheers to Idaho's Catastrophic Health Care Board, which this week officially cut its ties with Idaho Falls attorney Blake Hall, whose law firm had administered the state's indigent health care program for decades.
The board actually took Hall off the job last month. His firm, however, was allowed to keep processing claims for the state. That ended this week as the board voted unanimously to turn over processing duties on an interim basis to the Idaho Association of Counties.
Hall, of course, recently pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor stalking charge. In doing so, we believe he disqualified himself from raking in taxpayer dollars, though the folks in Fremont County continue to pay Hall to act as a deputy prosecutor.
The CAT Fund board has not finalized its deal with the IAC, but Chairman Roger Christensen, a Bonneville County commissioner, said he anticipates "significant savings" for the taxpayers. Also worth noting is the bipartisan nature of this board. In charge of handling the AIC contract are two legislators, Democrat Kate Kelly of Boise and Republican Tom Loertscher of Bonneville County.
AIC will handle claims processing on an interim basis, Christensen said, until the board can figure out if it's best to do the job in-house, at the Department of Health and Welfare, or contract the job out to a private firm.
Jeers to Sen. Mike Crapo, R-Idaho, for his recent guest column praising the Tea Party movement. Actually it's not the column itself that stuck in our craw, but the following line: "It is puzzling that the media, which champions its own freedom granted in the First Amendment, is not championing the same right for another group that is granted freedom of speech in the same Constitutional amendment."
What a crock. Nobody is challenging the Tea Partiers' right to speak their minds. Many people, and not just those who work at newspapers, do take umbrage at what they are saying, and the tactics they employ, including the use of a float insulting to the president of the United States in the Idaho Falls Fourth of July parade.
And some folks certainly wonder where the Tea Partiers were during the Bush presidency, when the country began its spiral into debt and stretched the Constitution with laws such as the Patriot Act and Real ID.
So, Sen. Crapo, let's be clear: the Tea Party folk have every right to be obnoxious, wrong and hypocritical. And we have every right to point that out.
Cheers to Bonneville County Republican Party Chairman Damond Watkins, who was recently elected to replace Hall as a national committeeman. That means Watkins will become one of three Idahoans to serve on the Republican National Committee.
Normally, partisan politics aren't our thing. But it's good to see a local guy do well, and Watkins over the years has proven himself to be capable, intelligent and reasonable.
Idaho Republicans should be proud. They picked the right guy for the job.
Jeers to Senate Republican Caucus Chairman Russ Fulcher of Meridian, who called the Democratic response to Otter's State of the State address "contradictory" and "reckless," and said it "amounted to little more than nay-saying."
What did those pesky Democrats say? Well, they said cutting school budgets is a bad thing. They proposed hiring more tax collectors in order to chase down money that is owed but has not been received. They talked about job creation. They said lawmakers ought to look at reversing the 2006 tax shift, which saw public school funding taken off the stable property tax and placed on the volatile sales tax. And the D's said we might want to look at the $1.7 billion in sales tax exemptions in order to spare public schools and higher education from even deeper cuts.
The only reckless thing here is Fulcher's rhetoric.
Cheers to Jerome Republican Maxine Bell, the co-chairwoman of the Legislature's budget-writing committee. Bell recognizes what Otter's shop does not: that Idaho Public Television has value and is well worth the $1.6 million in annual funding the state provides.
Otter, of course, has proposed a four-year phaseout of state funding for IPTV, a move that makes no sense because taxpayers just spent $14 million on a conversion to digital transmission. Bell, speaking to Otter's budget chief, Wayne Hammon, was judicious, according to reporting by the Spokesman Review's Betsy Russell, but made it clear that IPTV, though its performance, has earned its support.
"Your visit with Rep. (Shirley) Ringo about public broadcasting showed that they really have a right to some general funds in what they're doing -- perhaps just a different way of reorganizing will help," Bell said.
Jeers to the Idaho Freedom Foundation for a misleading statement in its Idaho Pork Report, released last week. In the report, the foundation bashed a $3,672 Idaho Commission on the Arts grant to Big Tree Arts.
The foundation then pointed out that Big Tree Arts hosted a performance by somebody called Bennie the Drunken Poet. The Pork Report never says the grant paid directly for Bennie's performance, but the inference is clear.
According to Idaho Commission on the Arts Director Michael Faison, the grant money actually helped pay for monthly poetry workshops and to educate kids at Hays Shelter Home and Frank Church Alternative High School.
Originally posted at http://www.postregister.com/story.php?accnum=1025-01152010&today=2010-01-15
The Opinion posted here is provided by permission of its original publisher and does not necessarily reflect the views of Idaho Public Television.