Ag commissioner announces layoffs

The commissioner of the state’s agriculture department has started notifying about 60 workers they will be laid off to make cuts necessary to balance the budget.
Commissioner John McMillan said the department informed 17 people this week that they were being laid off and expects to announce more layoffs next week. Those employees who are laid off will remain on the payroll through April.
He said he is trying to cut personnel without affecting the departments that handle food safety and consumer protection. McMillan said he is eliminating the two-person international trade section.
The commissioner said international trade is "mighty important," but not as important as the department’s duties inspecting poultry flocks and meat processors in the state to try to catch any instances of avian flu, hoof and mouth disease, or any other disease or danger.
The department, as evidenced by the stickers on gas pumps throughout the state, is also responsible for inspecting pumps and scales such as those in grocery stores.
The agriculture department is in the last tier of priorities for the administration of Gov. Robert Bentley. In that tier, all departments or agencies are cut at least 45 percent.
McMillan said he knew when he entered the office in January that "we had some challenges, but I didn’t have any idea." He said he was expecting about 10 percent proration in the General Fund this year and about 15 percent cuts for the 2012 budget.
Instead, most agencies in the General Fund are facing 15 percent proration, across the board cuts declared by the governor to balance the budget.
McMillan said that proration led to an immediate cut of $2.3 million and that the department faces another $4.7 million cut in the 2012 fiscal year, which begins Oct. 1.
"It's deeply troubling, but we have had no other choice but to reduce staff," McMillan said.
McMillan said he brought four employees with him when he started as commissioner including at least one that worked for his campaign.
"The people that I brought in I chose very carefully for their knowledge and experience with the intent of making a good many changes in the department," he said. McMillan said he wanted them to help analyze and evaluate issues at the department.
"They have the ability to work hard. They are going to have to shoulder a lot more of the load, as is everybody that will still be out there."


-- posted by Sebastian Kitchen

Bentleys cutting back at mansion

Gov. Robert Bentley, talking Monday at the Montgomery Advertiser about the budgets, said he and his wife are trying to save the state money at the mansion.

He said he and his wife, Dianne, had the six phone lines coming into the mansion cut to one. And they decided they only needed one cable box instead of four.

The governor said his wife is frugal and they are cutting services and saving money where they can.

The governor's mansion has a current budget of $311,519 with a proposed budget of $185,352 for the fiscal year that starts Oct. 1.

-- posted by Sebastian Kitchen

Ala. Medicaid Ask for $700M

The loss of federal stimulus dollars and the continuing increase of the number of people in Alabama who are eligible for Medicaid has doubled what the state needs just to level fund existing services.

Dr. R. Bob Mullins, new commissioner for Alabama Medicaid, told lawmakers Wednesday that his agency needs an estimated $700 million to continue offering the bare minimum of what the state’s conservative program already provides.

The money would help support the 91,000 new enrollees who have become eligible for Medicaid since fiscal 2010. It also would fill in the gap for the $270 million in federal stimulus money that the state will lose after this year, and make up for a less favorable federal matching rate that goes into effect in fiscal 2012. Lawmakers appropriated about $345 million from the state General Fund for fiscal 2011.

Mullins, who only has been on the job for a little over three weeks, clearly recognized the staggering nature of the news he was delivering to state lawmakers. Lawmakers learned Tuesday that they are facing budgets that have healthy deficits for fiscal 2012.

“Between the budget and the state merit system this job is wearing thin in a hurry,” Mullins joked. “I was thinking that I must be out of my mind to take this job. I’m beginning to wonder if I was.”

Mullins is feeling the heat because he’s asking for a significant chunk of the state’s General Fund during a year when the state is expecting a more than $131 million shortfall and even greater deficits in fiscal 2012. Those shortfalls are only compounded by the fact that when federal health care reform starts to kick in just two years, the program will have to absorb more people.

But that didn’t stop Mullins from impressing upon state lawmakers how Medicaid not only undergirds the state’s rural health system, but also is intertwined with the health care of Alabamians who have private health insurance.

-- posted by Markeshia Ricks

Lawmakers Learn Bentley Administration Budget Principles

David Perry, Gov. Robert Bentley's new finance director, outlined Tuesday during a budget hearing the governor's principles for budgeting in what is could be multiple years of difficult budget decisions.

Here's what Perry had to say about the Bentley administration budget principles:

1) Conservative budgeting.
"We must take a more conservative and responsible approach to the process of the budget," Perry said. "We can’t afford to continue to put our schools through this budgeting process. Proration cannot always be entirely avoided, but it can be minimized. It can be reduced."

2) A better job of allocating resources.

"We cannot continue to fund programs at the same level and proportion as we have in the past," Perry said.

3) Prioritizing people over projects.

"You’re going to have some very difficult decision in the next few years and particularly in the next four months," Perry told lawmakers. "Our job will be to help you understand what the consequences will be of the budget decisions we’ll make over the next few months.

4) Working with Legislature on the front end of budgeting process

5) Structural long-term reform

"We can’t grow our way out of a hole this big," he said of the deficits the state is facing, particularly in the General Fund. "What we really have to look at is the fundamental realignment and restructuring of state government."

Perry said the governor's Commission to Improve State Government would play a crucial role in the kind of restructuring that will be necessary to reduce costs.

6) Everything is on the table
"In our judgment, based on the severity of the shortfalls, everything has to be on the table," Perry said. "We’re not only looking at cuts, we’re also looking at opportunities for revenue. "

Perry pointed out Bentley's desire on the campaign trail to look at finding a way to collect lost sales tax revenue from online sales.

-- posted by Markeshia Ricks