Browning Attacked Because Lehigh County Spends $5.4 MM Less Than Budgeted

While I've been busy in Northampton County dealing with pesky little otters and blatant election law violations by unions behind the Gracedale initiative, Lehigh County's Gang of Four has turned up the heat on Dean Browning. You see, Browning is the only Republican Commissioner who refused to follow party boss Wayne Woodman's directive to send Don Cunningham's budget back. Now, recent news that Cunningham was able to finish 2010 with a $5.4 million surplus, is being used as a campaign talking point.

Any municipal government that can finish a year in the black in these hard economic times deserves some credit for sound budgeting. Yet in the strange world of the Gang of Four, deficits are preferable to surpluses. In a news release, they cite that $5.4 million as proof that Browning failed to "fight for taxpayers." I suppose they prefer people like Bethlehem's John Callahan and Allentown's Ed Pawlowski, who overspend and regularly finish each year in the red.

Tea Party blowhard Joe Hilliard, in a solicitation for his "Citizens Alliance of Pa.," cites this surplus as proof that Browning and Cunningham could have avoided a tax hike, and asks for donations so that he can "educate" voters.

Hilliard, incidentally, has been doing an audit of Lehigh County 2009 finances since February 2010. He should be finished sometime in the next century.

Dean Browning has responded to Hilliard's solicitation, noting that "[y]ou know as well as I do that the idea of sending the budget back was to quote, 'make Don Cunningham own the budget' and wasn’t a serious attempt to produce a budget with no tax increase."

It was political gamesmanship.

According to Browning, last year's tax hike was inevitable. In fact, he predicted it five years ago. Here's why, according to Browning himself. "[T]he last time that County revenue equaled expenses was with the budget for 2005. At the end of 2005, then County Executive Jane Ervin cut taxes by ½ mil (from 10.75 mils to 10.25 mils) which translated in to a roughly $4 million reduction in revenue. However, neither Jane nor the then Board of Commissioners made any corresponding reductions in recurring expenses. Instead, they chose to use the remaining surplus generated from the 70% tax increase in 2003 to setup something called the 'Tax Relief Fund' which was to be used cover the growing structural gap in the County’s budget. Obviously, once that path was chosen it was inevitable that a future tax increase would be needed when the Tax Relief Fund was exhausted."

You see, under spending 2010's budget is no proof that no tax hike was needed in 2011. Browning explains.

"For 2010, the County’s budget expenses were $111.0 million and the budget revenue (at 10.25 mils) was $91.5 million. The resulting gap of $19.5 million was covered by almost all of what remained in the Tax Relief Fund. ... . The County’s budget expenses for 2011 are $110.1 million (reduced from 2010) and the budget revenue (at the new rate of 11.9 mils) is $106.0 million with the gap being filled by all that is left in the Tax Relief Fund. With that, it is apparent that even without any inflationary increase in spending, we are looking at a gap, or actual deficit, of $4 million dollars for 2012 that will have to be filled if we are to avoid another tax increase. And that is with the higher revenue generated by the increased millage rate. Saying the County could have covered the budgeted spending for 2011 ($110.1 million) on $91 million of revenue (generated by the old millage rate) is not possible. There simply is not enough money in the Operating Fund and remaining in the Tax Relief Fund to do that for 2011 let alone for 2012."

So if Lehigh County wants to avoid yet another tax hike for 2012, it needs to plug a $4 million projected deficit. One way to do that is by spending less than was actually budgeted.

According to Browning, "I find it a bit bizarre that it is suddenly a 'bad thing' for a government entity to make a conscious decision to spend less than was budgeted."

Only in the bizarro world of Joe Hilliard and the Gang of Four.