Passing the Buck

When in doubt at the Lege, attack the media. So it went last week in the House, as Public Education Committee Chair Kent Grusendorf, R-Arlington, excoriated the press for describing House Bill 1 that morning as a "shell bill" that had been "gutted" the previous day in order to pass something, anything, on to the Senate. "This is not a shell bill," he declared, laying out HB 1 for the third and final vote. "This bill received a bipartisan vote in committee [Ron Wilson will certainly be missed, at least by Republicans] for significant and historic reforms in education." Grusendorf went on to describe those "historic" reforms, which he claimed include "the first time in history that we've linked spending to results" (apparently a decade's worth of accountability-test worship has been simply a mirage) and "aggressive mentoring programs" (until somebody was rude enough to point out that the mentoring funds had in fact been stripped from the bill).

It was a valiant effort, and Grusendorf repeated himself at such length that Rep. Garnet Coleman, D-Houston, turned to a reporter and asked, "Is he trying to convince me or you?" Came the sardonic response: "He's trying to convince himself."

And he managed to do a pretty good job, until Rep. Steve Wolens, D-Dallas, stepped to the back mic and pointed out that it was Grusendorf himself, the day before, who had used the term "shell bill" to describe what the House had done by drafting its school spending program but killing those elements of the plan designed to fund it. "I think I misspoke," lamely responded Grusendorf. "It's a great bill in some respects."

It was not a great day for the House Republicans, although in the end they passed their shell bill, 75-68, on to an unamused Senate ("They may as well have sent us a piece of paper saying 'Howdy,'" complained Sen. Kyle Janek, R-Houston). They even picked up a couple of votes over the day before, thanks to yet another morning spent on backroom arm-twisting by Speaker Tom Craddick. It's a difficult thing to run a Legislature with one eye on the clock, another on the governor, and both ears attuned to the business lobby – leaving very few faculties left over for the matter at hand.

---

Ill Advised

All in all, not the Legislature's finest hour, made worse by the politically perplexing decision of the House leadership to silence, procedurally, even the discussion of some 200 pending amendments to a massive bill that few members had been allowed the time to read. The arbitrary silencing gave the Scourge of El Paso, Democrat Paul Moreno, an opportunity to lambaste his Republican colleagues for the "arrogance of power," and demand of them, "Can you look me in the eyes and tell me, 'I'm being fair'?" Moreno, the chamber's longest-serving Democrat (only Craddick has as much seniority), invoked the tyrannical early Seventies reign of Speaker Gus Mutscher – "Gus Mutscher didn't come close to doing these things" – and said he had been considering retirement after more than three decades in the Lege, but declared instead, "I'm going to run again for only one reason – to get even."

After three re-redistricting sessions, Moreno's reflexive diatribes have become virtually routine and are largely ignored. Yet it seemed odd that not a single Republican felt sufficiently insulted to at least respond to the slurs on the majority's integrity. More telling were quieter rebukes from Wolens and Craig Eiland, D-Galveston, neither considered bomb-throwers and generally deeply respected by their colleagues. Wolens lamented the shutdown of debate and plaintively asked his "friend of many years" Craddick, "What would you do, if you were in my place, and Gus Mutscher had done this to you?" Eiland demanded repeatedly, "Is this the way it's going to be from now on?"

In response, all Craddick could muster was, "The speaker is not advised."

---

Get Out Your Sun Screen

That could be said of the entire Capitol project at the moment, under which Gov. Rick Perry demanded the Legislature take on the contrary assignments of fairly funding public education while radically cutting property taxes, and then proceeded to undermine their more-or-less good faith effort to do so. Perry apparently felt a bit insulted that not a single House member would carry his own plan to the floor, so he publicly kicked the slats (any kind of a broad-based business tax) out from under the House alternative. In response, the House duly took up Perry's plan, and just as quickly – in what one Republican described as "shotgun practice" – blew it all to ribbons, 126-0. Even the "shell bill" that eventually passed was further undermined by the spectacular failure of the accompanying constitutional amendment. The latter not only didn't garner the 100 votes necessary, but went down in flames 119-26.

So here's where we are. This week the Senate takes up the House bill, but not a single senator will speak for it, and instead the Senate leadership has said they will try to draft a bill of their own. Few are optimistic they can solve the puzzle, and they are also in no hurry to volunteer as scapegoats for the House and Perry. While all give lip service to cutting property taxes, they are equally aware that the governor has declared his opposition (and potential veto) to any broad-based business tax to replace property-tax revenue – leaving on the table only a major increase in the sales tax or a massive expansion of gambling in the form of thousands of slot machines. The House held its nose and raised the sales tax – but subjected the slot machine proposal to such grandiloquent disdain that all the lobbyists in Nevada may find it hard to fix the odds.

If I were a betting man, I'd wager the special session's May 19 deadline will come and go without a workable public school finance plan, let alone a fair and efficient one. But the governor is barnstorming against property taxes, the Texas summer is long, and this Legislature's strenuous pursuit of futility seems likely to be extended.