At this moment, when the state’s fiscal condition is in disarray, it’s difficult to envision exactly what state government might look like a year from now. But focusing that vision is exactly what lawmakers will have to do, and the process needs to begin soon.

They are starting off with a huge disadvantage: Settlement of the public-employee union contracts lies somewhere in the murky future. There’s ambiguity in what they’ll have to work with — the size of the budget hole and the costs of labor — yet the work of budget planning can’t be postponed for long.
Friday marked the 50th anniversary of Hawai'i statehood, the primary observance being the forward-looking “New Horizons” conference. But that perspective requires some acknowledgment of the now-clouded view of the horizon.
At the conference’s session on the recession and beyond, Pearl Imada Iboshi, the state’s chief economist, said Hawai'i lost 29,100 jobs in two years. And, she said, that kind of sudden decline siphons off much of the fuel needed for the return to fiscal stability and growth: consumer confidence.
It’s consumers that feed the tax coffers for local government, and once they start buying again, it takes a while for that revenue boost to trickle down, said Jon Shure, a Washington-based public-policy analyst.
Shure is deputy director of the State Fiscal Project of The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, a research group in the nation’s capital. He told The Advertiser last week that it may be several years before recovery will generate the kind of resources, through existing taxation schemes, that states need to return to pre-recession levels of function.
The center’s primary mission is studying ways to generate new revenue for essential programs. But Shure also acknowledged that a refocusing on core duties of government — making sure limited funds go to its most critical missions — should always be part of the debate.
He’s right, and in Hawai'i it’s good to see some state leaders gearing up for the task.
State House Speaker Calvin Say said he is planning a caucus in the coming weeks to review fiscal priorities and develop a strategy for tackling the budget challenge they will confront in January.
Even before that discussion begins, Say could easily predict that bedrock programs such as public education, health and safety — often described as the “social safety net” — will have to top the list.
During these tight economic times, statistics seem to underscore that point. The enrollment in the food stamps program has risen by about a quarter since the recession became acute last fall. And the economic downturn is threatening to curb critical health care services offered to Hawai'i’s migrant population.
Public schools, too, are still reeling under budget cuts mandated by the precipitous drop in tax revenues.
But besides safety-net concerns, there are also crucial programs that promote economic development — seeds that must be planted now if the state is to be able to thrive as the recovery finally brings fiscal relief to state government.
Say has not ruled out pursuing new revenues. Although he’s staunchly opposed raising the general excise tax, he suggests pressing federal authorities to suspend requirements for states to provide matching funds in order to receive federal grants.
Fair enough. However, there will be no avoiding cutting some programs completely and reassigning others to be fulfilled, at least for the immediate future, through private partnerships.
Politicians don’t relish making tough choices or eliminating programs that have become part of the landscape. But that is the job they were elected to do.