Thank God for Unanswered Prayers
When every new member is elected to the legislature there is a time period from when your election occurs until you actually start your legislative duties. It is during this every member engages in intense lobbying for committee assignments.
Contrary to what might be printed in the newspaper or on television, the real work of the House happens in the committees. Some committees are more powerful by their very nature than others. All of them tend to focus on a particular specialty like agriculture or banking except for three committees: General Fund Appropriations Committee, Education Trust Fund Appropriations Committee and the Rules Committee.
Every freshman legislator comes in to office wanting to be on one of the budget committees (count me in that number who lobbied to be on one of the budget committees). Since there are only so many slot on each committee there are many more disappointments than there are people who are happy with the end result. I was one of those on the disappointed lists until recently. No I did not get appointed to the budget committees and now I am saying thank God for unanswered prayers. Both of those committees have to deal with some of the toughest decisions in state government today. The choices they have to make are do we cut this program or eliminate that program? This decision making process guarantees that you will make someone mad and very few people happy.
These decisions are amplified in years like this one when the budget is extremely strapped. So instead of being a rainmaker for various projects throughout the state, these lawmakers have the ominous duty of being the bearer of bad news. They have to decide how to come up with hundreds of millions in more dollars for Medicaid or just eliminate services for the poor and elderly. In the education budget committee a choice will have to be made to either cut services for K-12 so higher education can remain even with last year’s budget or cut higher education drastically so K-12 can remain even with last year’s budget. All this is said knowing that next year will be equally as bad as this year.
I lobbied hard to be put on the budget committees and was disappointed when I did not get put on the committees of my choice. Thank God for unanswered prayers!
