Steve Flowers: Inside the Statehouse: Alabama's Groundhog Day budget

  Some of you may have seen and remember the movie, Groundhog Day, starring Bill Murray. In the comedy, Murray awakens on Groundhog Day and has the identical day that he had the previous year, similar to Yogi Berra’s colloquial saying of “déjà vu all over again.” Well, folks, this year’s legislative session began on Groundhog Day and it is déjà vu all over again. It is like it is last year again.

  Similar to the way realtors say, “it is location, location, location,” with Alabama government it is the General Fund, General Fund, General Fund. Several legislators optimistically predicted that they would have the budgets out by the middle of the session.

Darrio Melton: Medicaid expansion could help solve Alabama's budget crunch

  With all the chaos coming out of the Governor’s Mansion in the past month, it’s been easy to overlook the chaos coming out of the State House. While Gov. Robert Bentley has been tied up in a scandal, the Alabama Legislature has continued to meet and vote on legislation, which has all subsequently made it to the governor’s desk.

  One such piece of legislation is the General Fund budget. For the past few years, we’ve argued over whether we need more cuts or more funding, and the truthful answer is that we need a little bit of both. The legislature doesn’t have an appetite for new taxes, so the General Fund budget that made it to Bentley’s desk underfunds Medicaid by around $85 million.

Steve Flowers: Inside the Statehouse: Bracing for a raid of Alabama's education budget

  As discussed last week, several of the headline Alabama news stories of 2015 may also be the blockbusters of 2016. The Mike Hubbard trial and the decision of the federal courts on Alabama’s legislative district lines will be determined in the first half of this year.

  The biggest news and political story of this year may be a continuation of last year’s major issue, and it also surrounds the Alabama Legislature. The state's General Fund woes will again be front and center.

Darrio Melton: We can't keep cutting our way out of a budget crisis

  As we're moving into the New Year, Alabama legislators are--once again--focused on old problems that have only been placated by patchwork solutions: namely, our state budget. The 2016 legislative session is right around the corner, and the Republican leadership is wasting no time saying how this session is going to be exactly like the last one.

  Remember the last one? The Republican supermajority's in-fighting sent us into two special sessions, spending hundreds of thousands of taxpayer dollars before we finally passed a make-shift budget.

Hank Sanders: Senate Sketches #1475: Put your money where your mouth is

  Put your money where your mouth is. I heard this saying many times when I was growing up. It means that we have to back up our talk with money or other valuables. Putting your money where your mouth is was a living challenge. The challenge continues to this day.

  Let me go a little further. The Good Book (Matthew 6:21) says that, "For where your treasure is, there your heart will be." Luke 12:34 says it a little differently. "For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also." We can tell what is important to us by where we put our money and/or other valuables. This is no less true for state budgets. Put your money where your mouth is.

Darrio Melton: This budget crisis is a ticking time bomb for Alabama

  Monday marked exactly one month before the state enters full-blown crisis mode without a functional general fund budget. Governor Robert Bentley called a special session to resolve the $300 million budget shortfall, and it was a tremendous failure to say the least. Three different Republican leaders are fixed firmly on three different plans for the state of Alabama, but it seems to me the right hand doesn't understand what the left is doing, and nobody is willing to compromise to find the solutions that will work for the people of Alabama.

Hank Sanders: Senate Sketches #1470: Alabama's bad tooth syndrome

  “Son, most people have the bad tooth syndrome. I hope you never have the bad tooth syndrome.” These words were spoken by my dear mother who passed 18 years ago. She had a 7th grade education but was one of the wisest persons I've ever known.

  My mother was Ola Mae Sanders who gave birth to 13 children. She was not only wise but really had a way with words. The following is how she explained the bad tooth syndrome.

Craig Ford: GOP legislators need to stop blaming Democrats and start leading

  Republicans legislators are actually blaming Democrats for voting AGAINST tax increases! Folks, the wheels have come off the bus in Montgomery.

  Republican legislators need to stop blaming Democrats and start leading.

  The wheels have come off the bus in Montgomery. That’s the only way to describe what’s happening in our state legislature. Now more than ever is the time for legislators to reach across the aisle and work together to solve this budget crisis. But instead, Republican legislators are attempting to blame Democrats because they can’t pass their own tax package.

Craig Ford: Robbing our children is not the answer

  Legislators return to Montgomery next week, and one of the bills that has been introduced would combine the state's education and general fund budgets. I think that would be a disaster for our state, and here's why:

  Robbing our children is not the answer.

Craig Ford: You can’t fix something you don’t believe in

  For months, we have been told that the state needs at least another $200 million to avoid catastrophe. We have been told that we are broke because the way we budget for our state government is broken.

  Unfortunately, what we have been told is true: our government is broke, and it is broken. But you can’t fix something if you don’t believe in it, and our state leaders don’t believe in government.

Steve Flowers: Inside the Statehouse: The tale of two budgets

  As the legislative session was winding down, it was obvious no solution was going to be found for the beleaguered General Fund Budget. The Governor Bentley's $541 million tax increase proposal had been ignored. Although he still kept preaching that this was the prescription for the ailing General Fund, the good doctor’s prognosis and recommended course of treatment was completely disregarded.

Steve Flowers: Inside the Statehouse: Sizing up the budget crunch

  Alabama is only one of a handful of states that work out of two budgets. We have a General Fund Budget and a separate Education Budget. Our General Fund is where the severe problem rests. The reason is that the General Fund gets none of the growth taxes, so its volume of revenue has remained the same for decades.

  The Alabama Legislature failed to find a solution during the four-month regular legislative session. The new fiscal year begins October 1. Therefore, a summer special session will be necessary.

Steve Flowers: Inside the Statehouse: Countdown to the special session

  The regular legislative session ended without a General Fund Budget. As we look back politically on the first half of the year, the dilemma with the General Fund has been the dominant issue. It has been at the forefront since the beginning of the year and it is not yet resolved.

  After five months of wrangling over the beleaguered General Fund Budget, a late summer special session is in the works. The state must have a budget by October 1, when the new fiscal year begins.

Craig Ford: Can the Alabama Legislature solve this budget crisis?

  It’s been a joke on the internet for who knows how long: somebody takes a picture of a stop sign missing a letter or the University of Minnesota’s logo painted on the 45 yard line instead of at midfield, and there’s a caption that reads, “You had one job to do.”

  The Alabama Legislature also only has one job it is required by law to do: pass the budgets. But this year, thanks to Republicans in the senate, the legislature didn’t pass a budget, and we are no closer today than we were back in February to solving the budget crisis. Now our state legislature is the butt of the joke, and the taxpayers aren’t laughing.

Steve Flowers: Inside the Statehouse: Special session likely on tap for legislature

  We are in the final days of the first regular legislative session of the quadrennium. The session constitutionally has to end June 15. The governor and legislature are at a standoff. The financial dilemma in the General Fund has not been addressed and the budgets are up in the air.

  As the session began four months ago, Gov. Robert Bentley was the first to cry wolf. No Republican likes to say the word tax, much less propose such a solution or vote for such a blasphemous resolution.

Craig Ford: Combining Alabama’s two budgets would make the crisis worse

  It’s no secret that the State of Alabama is in a budget crisis. It’s a crisis that we’ve known for three years was coming, but our state leaders waited until the elections were over before they publicly acknowledged it or offered any solutions. There have been several solutions proposed, from more taxes to expanding gambling. However, the most recent proposed solution isn’t really a solution at all.

  Last week, a committee in the Alabama Senate passed a proposed constitutional amendment that would combine the state’s two budgets. Combining the General Fund budget and the Education Trust Fund budget into one big budget won’t solve the problem, and it certainly isn’t in the best interests of our state despite what others might be saying.

Craig Ford: Dear Senators, what would Jesus do?

  Before the Alabama Senate votes on the General Fund budget, the senators need to ask themselves, "What would Jesus do?"

  We are often reminded that this nation was founded on Christian principles, and certainly a majority of the representatives in the Alabama Legislature are Christians. So when the General Fund budget, which finances all government services and agencies outside of education, came up for a vote last week, I couldn’t help but think about that popular phrase from the 90s, “What would Jesus do?” The “WWJD” phrase has been used to guide Christians through a lot of tough decisions. So it only makes sense that most members of the Alabama House should have asked themselves that question before they voted on that budget.

Katherine Green Robertson: If everything is a priority then nothing is a priority

  As the debate over Alabama’s General Fund budget shortfall continues, four schools of thought have emerged on how to solve this problem: a) tax increases, b) gambling revenue, c) unearmarking, d) and across-the-board cuts. Each one of these proposals has been deemed the obvious, simple solution to the problem, but none would actually be that straightforward. As proposed, three of the four would require the second, overlooked step of prioritizing spending—a difficult task in a currently fragmented Republican majority.

Craig Ford: Our legislature thinks brown shrimp are more important than people

  When I first saw the list of bills we would be debating in the Alabama House of Representative last Thursday, I thought it was a joke. The first bill up for debate was a bill to make brown shrimp the official state crustacean.

  This is your state legislature's priorities, folks. Not peoples’ lives or jobs, and certainly not being responsible with your tax dollars... brown shrimp. That's the priority. You just can't make this stuff up!

Steve Flowers: Inside the Statehouse: Can the doctor cure the General Fund?

  Our good doctor governor, Robert Bentley, has done a thorough physical exam on the state’s finances and his diagnosis is that the General Fund needs additional revenue. His Republican comrades in the legislature have been trying to starve the patient for the past four years. If the patient is an analogy to the state government, the approach over the past four years has been to put the patient on a rigid diet of starvation and bleeding to death in pretty much the same way that George Washington’s doctors did in his day. The patient according to basic tenets of medicine or government should weigh about 180 pounds. The legislature has starved the patient/government to 120 pounds of skin and bones.