Let's make a deal...pretty please?

The lesson for today, kids, brought to us by Governor Perry: If at first you don't succeed, lower your standards.

Gov. Rick Perry on Monday indicated he would accept a scaled-back school finance bill with a pay raise for teachers and no property tax relief if that is all he can get from the Legislature this summer.

[...]

While signing a bill establishing new renewable energy goals for Texas, Perry was asked about rumors that legislators want to give up on school finance reform and property tax relief and just pass legislation to pay for textbooks and a teacher pay raise before adjourning.

Perry indicated he might be willing to take such a better-than-nothing bill.

"If you can get half a loaf versus a full loaf, you generally take a slice or two, if you can get that," Perry said. "We understand how this process plays out here."

"Hell, even a few crumbs off the heel is still something, right?" he did not add. You almost have to feel sorry for the guy, if you can get past the fact that it's totally his fault that we are where we are.

Perry said he intends to sign into law the bill that would restore $33 billion in public school funding that he vetoed in June. Perry had eliminated the money from the state budget to give lawmakers an incentive to pass broad school and tax reform legislation.

You can tack on another $3.4 million to that amount, as that's the cost of the two failed special sessions that Perry called.

If the Legislature fails, Perry said he will make it an election issue.

"There's going to be an election in the not too distant future. The issue of appraisal caps and revenue caps and property tax relief is going to be a very high-profile issue. We can either do it now or we can talk about it in March and November of 2006," Perry said.

Funnily enough, some people have been talking about this all along, and no doubt will continue to do so all the way through March and November of next year. I rather doubt that any House member is quaking at the thought of Rick Perry campaigning against the Legislature. I don't think any of them will have too much difficulty explaining to their constituents why their opposition to the Perry Plan (average margin of defeat over two different sessions: 125-4) was in the best interests of their districts.

Elsewhere, Eye on Williamson points to this excellent editorial which unpacks the failure of the Perry Plan piece by piece. Check it out.

Posted by Charles Kuffner on August 02, 2005 to Budget ballyhoo | TrackBack