I don’t have a lot of info here, but I did just get a copy of this constituent e-mail, from Mike Mrowicki, all around good guy (full disclosure: I knew Mike long before he was in the legislature, and he’s always had my respect and admiration, so anything I say about him is most likely colored through rose-tinted glasses):
Date: Fri, 18 Apr 2008 15:55:36 -0400
From: “Mike Mrowicki” <mmrowicki@leg.state.vt.us>
Subject: Re: budget news URGENT
Hi ,
We just got some updated numbers, which are a Democrat response to the
Administrations’ proposal from Wednesday.
The good news is that AHS cuts have been mitigated down to $5M (down
from $20M)
This also includes keeping the $800k for subsidy increase in the budget.
The negotiations will take place next week and things are open to lots
of possibilities happening, but it looks better than it did Wednesday.
I’ll keep you posted
The $5m in cuts are still a bitter pill, but far better than the original proposal. If anyone else has more details, please share.
Senator Shumlin was on the radio today calling the Governor’s mysterious, unspecified, heretofore only alluded-to-at-the-11th-hour, $100 million stimulus package a “fairy tale” in the face of the concurrent $25 million budget hole… but there are those who believe a real $100 million dollars worth of economic stimulus is suddenly availible in this budget, lurking just unseen, as per this report from CBS news…
From Godzilla and King Kong to Mike and Scully, monsters have always loomed large in the popular imagination. But what if one of these beasts actually existed – not just on some far away continent or in a film writer’s head, but in your own backyard?
Dennis Hall claims just that. Twenty years ago, he looked out onto the vastness of Lake Champlain near his home in Vergennes, Vt., and after seeing what he saw, he’s never looked back. Hall has made the quest for [the Governor’s $100 million stimulus package] the focus of his life.
He isn’t the only one who believes a [a $100 million stimulus package] lurks in those waters, reports Saturday Early Show Co-Anchor Russ Mitchell. Sighting sheets from last summer carry entries by people ranging from kids to full-grown adults. And then there are videos.
Sightings of [a $100 million stimulus package] are nothing new. There are even cave drawings of something that looks a lot like [a $100 million stimulus package] dating back to the 1700s. These days, there are scores of sightings each year. And on the streets of Burlington, Vt., you are likely to get a first-person account.
Whether [it] actually exists or not, the legend of [the Governor’s $100 million stimulus package] is certainly a real part of local life Mascots, car washes, commerce, even politicians celebrate the beast.
Of course, not everyone from the [area] is convinced.
“I don’t honestly believe there’s something that big out there,” says Ellen Marsden, a professor who has been studying the [area] for more than five years. “We need something mysterious … that we don’t understand yet. I think it fills a human need. But– if you’re going to start subjecting it to the scrutiny of science, it’s not as easy to explain.”
But Dennis Hall says those who don’t believe in [the Governor’s $100 million stimulus package] are missing out on something.
“Well, they’re missing out on the possibilities that there’s a little more in this world than what meets the eye,” he says.
The crew from The Saturday Early Show looked and looked, but they didn’t see [the Governor’s $100 million stimulus package].
A few edits for content of course, just for clarification.
UPDATE:Some more down-to-earth, er… “detail”… via the Dems:
That's right, if you're all worried about people who aren't qualified to teach or do science getting fired from their jobs as scientists, this is the movie for you. Right-wing gasbag Ben Stein, who got his start on the national scene as a speech writer for Richard Nixon, is speaking at UVM next week in conjunction with the opening run of Expelled, a silly little movie that makes the unfounded claim that Big Science is engaged in a war against religious believers.
If you haven't heard of Expelled, you definitely should follow up on this. PZ has had a lot of coverage, partly arising from the fact that, although he's in the movie, when they showed it in Minnesota they wouldn't let him in and threatened him with arrest. Expelled Exposed is a whole web page devoted to it, and the Skeptics Society just posted an extended explanation of why the whole movie is a pack of lies.
I haven't seen it myself, and I'm not sure I'm going to bother. Still, it might be worth a trip to the Ira Allen Chapel, armed with one or two of the exposes, and try to get Ben Stein to defend the indefensible.
I just uploaded a file to Green Mountain Daily that you can find here.
Its original was downloaded from the state legislature’s web site, and at the time it was downloaded (Thursday, 4/17, around 6:20pm), you could find it via this link. I made a copy because I want to preserve the original draft budget changes, even if they are revised in the future.
So here’s the deal: although, as reported below, our oh-so-wonderful Governor is planning a $100M stimulus package, we need to make up a budget shortfall of $24.5M.
The document I referenced above includes a series of budget cuts to make up that shortfall, including around $19M in cuts to human services. These cuts include removing a planned adjustment to child care benefits to update eligibility levels which haven’t been updated since 1999. They include cutting benefits for at-risk families. They include the elimination of all state-funded prescription programs. The include upping premiums for state-supported health programs. The include eliminating the prison in St. Albans and outsourcing the prisons instead, which means laying off lots of people whom I’m sure would prefer to have their unemployment benefits and stimulus package instead of a regular paycheck.
This is last-minute and the legislature could be voting on this as soon as tomorrow, so Shumlin needs to be called first thing Friday morning:
Peter Shumlin
Senate President Pro Tem, Senate Appropriations
Montpelier Phone: 802-828-3806
This is really big and I haven’t seen it hit the media yet. If this happens, we’re letting down the people in our state who are, by far, the most vulnerable and have the fewest resources to fight back.
