LEGISLATURE LOOKS AT STATE PROGRAMS TO CUT

TALLAHASSEE - Florida lawmakers will start to tackle the steepest
budget cuts in state history Monday, the result of a chaotic economy
and grim financial forecasts.

Ideas already on the table: Squeezing more kids into classrooms.
Flat-lining school budgets. Freezing environmental funding. Cutting
costs at hospitals and nursing homes. Charging more for driver
licenses and court fees.

And then there's the list of programs that won't see the light of day
because legislators must write a 2008-09 budget that's 16 percent
lower -- $4.6 billion -- than the $72 billion budget they passed last
year.

The House is likely to delay the governor's climate-change initiatives
and teacher merit pay, and postpone a plan to renew Florida Forever,
the program that purchases land for conservation. The Senate is
looking at cutting back on FCAT tests and exams to certify new teachers.

And all talk of more property tax cuts are off the table as Republican
leaders turn their attention to the budget. Instead, they are steering
headlines to more rabble-rousing issues that appeal to their
conservative base -- such as allowing employees to bring concealed
weapons to work and arguing that Intelligent Design should be taught
as a scientific theory in the classroom along with evolution.

It's all made for a massive change of course for legislators
accostumed to constant growth in the fourth-most populous state. Now,
for the first time in recent memory, the state will be forced to work
with a drastically lower budget because it will collect less tax in
the coming fiscal year that begins July 1 than it did this year,
despite an increase in population.

"These are more than cuts. There's going to be bleeding. This is
deep," said Sen. Victor Crist, a Tampa Republican who chairs the
Senate's criminal justice budget committee. "We have to prioritize
the must-haves from the like-to-haves."

A few likely losers: Hospitals, nursing-home providers and anyone else
scraping by to help the 2.3 million people on Medicaid. Public
defenders, prosecutors and judges who say they're facing a crisis
already as crimes and court filings increase and staff decreases.
Teachers who will see the Legislature try to weaken the voter-approved
class-caps amendment.

Possible winners: Road builders and rail-line companies stand to earn
billions in economic-stimulus money if the Senate gets its way.
Private prison operators and prison construction companies stand to
gain as the state prison system -- now near capacity and close to
violating its constitutional cap -- builds two lock-ups yearly for the
next five years as the incarcerated population nears 100,000.

"When all you've ever dealt with are flush budgets, it's a whole
different mindset when you have to cut," said Rep. Ron Saunders, a
Key West Democrat who was chairman of the House budget committee in
1991-92, the last time the state faced a budget deficit near this
magnitude. "This may be a three-year downturn and that's the kind of
thing you can't make minimum cuts to. It's going to require a major
budget overhaul."

The laundry list of cuts, however, is far from ready and there's no
agreement yet between House and Senate leaders. What both sides appear
prepared to do are across-the-board cuts imposed on every agency.

Sources close to both the House and Senate say they will order
committees next week to prepare cuts of between 6 to 10 percent below
the already-reduced budgets of this year.

"It's going to be a percentage of reduction and those reductions will
be, for the most part, across the board," said Senate Republican
Leader Dan Webster of Orlando.

Senate budget chief Lisa Carlton showed budget committee chairmen a
sheet detailing how bad the cuts could be. It adds up to $2.59 billion
and includees: a $1.4 billion cut from education, $700 million from
health programs and nearly $400 million from prisons and juvenile justice.

"I wanted the appropriations chairs to see the magnitude that the
drop in revenues can have," Carlton said.

Last week, lawmakers priced out a list of more than 50 potential cuts
to the state's Medicaid program that could potentially save hundreds
of millions of dollars. The options included freezing or cutting
reimbursement rates to hospitals and HMOs that treat poor patients,
eliminating the state's Medically Needy program and slashing the
number of pregnant women eligible for Medicaid coverage.

The Senate is talking about saving $316 million by freezing the
Medicaid rate increase scheduled to take effect July for hospitals,
nursing homes and other health providers. The House is considering a
deeper freeze that would save $340 million.

Meanwhile, universities which have already cut back on freshman
admissions and face another $200 million cut, are talking about laying
off professors and shutting the door to transfers from community college.

Schools from kindergarten to high school aren't likely to be spared
either, though House leaders say they will protect schools from the
$179 million in cuts that should result from the property tax cut
voters approved in January.

State Education Commissioner Eric Smith told lawmakers last week that
the school testing programs could face cuts, including eliminating the
9th grade reading and math portions of the FCAT and reducing he number
of teachers who help review Florida's high-stakes test.

There are alternatives to cuts, but they don't have much support. For
example, a plan that passed the Senate last week to permit more
taxable gambling appears dead in the House.

Democrats want lawmakers to raise more money through closing tax
"loopholes" and by tapping state reserves dedicated for specific
purposes such as low-income housing or the environment.

But Senate leaders say raiding trust funds is not as easy as it
sounds.

"All of those trust funds have a constituency base," Carlson said.
"They are not going to want those dollars put somewhere else."