SEN. KIRK WATSON: It Is Time For Texas To Ask How We Are Going To Define Greatness

Last week, Capitol Annex sat down with State Sen. Kirk Watson (D-Austin) for a phone interview. As we’ve discovered after interviewing a number of lawmakers, it is often best–rather than to ask two dozen questions–to ask lawmakers to tell us what they are thinking on a few major topics of interest.

We were fortunate to hear from Senator Watson not only his thoughts on this session but some of his vision for the future of Texas. It was an illuminating conversation. Thanks to being able to type about 90 words per minute, we were able to capture most of his vision. Any mistakes are ours, not those of Senator Watson.

General Thoughts On The Session

I think the fact that we now have one more Democrat with potentially a second new Democrat, that works to our advantage in part because that means we’ll have situations where all 11 can’t agree for legitimate reasons—different districts, different needs–it gives more ability, I think, to help set an agenda and be involved in the carrying out of that agenda.

It also helps that House becomes more bipartisan by definition–there are more Democrats–helps  because as the session progresses, you’ve got the House having the ability to provide more measured legislation and that makes a difference in what gets through House and the Senate pays attention to.

Thoughts on the Appropriations Process

From a budget standpoint, in good times or bad, if you ask people what a session is going to be about, most will say it is about the budget. It’s always about the budget.

I think it is appropriate that it is the budget; it ought to be documents that define government–what people care about or hold as important. My personal belief is that Texas loses site of that and the leadership tends to focus on this for five months of session, and if we get it out, we’re working on something, we’ve done something. It’s not [the budget process] as open and transparent as it ought to be; there are far too few people involved,  and gimmicks used. We raise money to certify the budget, but it isn’t spent on what the people who pay the tax or fee were told it would be. The budget gets used to avoid or prevent debating or discussing big issues we’re facing.

Hang a fiscal note on something and that stops thoughts. Maybe that idea or bill or issue would be something we’d vote no on because it is costly, but we should at least have a debate on some of these issues. What I keep telling people is that we are budgeting by fear instead of forsight.

We don’t know exactly how much money we’ll have this cycle, but I tell people we’ve had three hurricanes: Hurricane Ike, Hurricane Lehman Brothers, and Hurricane Tax Shift. There is no question that Ike will have an impact on the budget. Lehman Brothers is a euphemism for international economic turmoil. Those trends have an impact on the state’s revenue. Third, the tax shift. There was all fanfare and self-congratulation when the new margins tax was passed and while it was structurally sound, and brings in more businesses and avoids certain constitutional challenges, it has not been administrated or implemented well. Right now, I’ve not been able to get a straight answer on how much revenue it will bring in and I am on the Business Tax Advisory Committee. And it is impossible to get good, reliable information. I get it–it is a new tax but we’ve had a massive change in the system and no real data on what that means to the state and I’m very worked that some will use it as an excuse to memorialize the old thinking of the past and guarantee compromises in services that are already compromised, or they’ll say, ‘let’s wait and see how it works out’ and ‘it will resolve itself,’ and that is not a responsible way.

This is an opportunity to have an open process and get accurate information and real facts, to make sure that the margins tax does what was promised to do, and let’s do something as we go into an economic downturn where we prepare a budget that establishes priorities and also helps stimulate the economy.

On priorities for this session

There are two or three things. The basic premise is that it is time for Texas to ask how we are going to define greatness. Our parents and grandparents, who are called the ‘Greatest Generation,’ didn’t define greatness by some specific stock market rally or specific corporate expansion.

Instead, they believed that their legacy was the one they left to future generations. In those of us who are paying attention, we see it everywhere: they founded schools leaving a generation no choice but to educate Texas children, a world class transportation system, and great universities. Today, too often our political figures seem to revel in a self-serving notion that our current good fortune is nothing more than their own skills and savvy. There is no question that Texas is prosperous, but it is very important to realize that rises from a foundation of investment made from our benefit. It made us smarter, kept us healthier, made us more and grow more freely than it had in the past.

I don’t believe we’re doing that for the next generation. We’re not leaving a similar inheritance. Preston Watson, my son, is a 19-year-old freshman in college. I worry that he is part of the first generation of Texans that doesn’t inherit infrastructure that has excess capacity in it so that his generation is able to grow their economic wealth and have the good fortune to inherit that excess capacity the way we were.

That’s pretty blunt–jarringly blunt–but ask yourself this question: are we worth more, are we more valuable, are we more deserving of prosperity than the kids coming behind us? I don’t think so.

It is time for Texas to begin a process–even as we face an economic downturn–of creating real priorities and structures for future generations.

Higher Education

We’re clearly falling behind, and it is time to fix that. We’ve got to try to take politics out of the process and create more flagship univiersities. It is wrong that only have two public flagship universities. California has more than three times that. New York has a smaller population and has eight. It matters. We’re falling behind. Our capacity seems to be frozen. Our investment is shrinking but the future and future needs are racing toward us. We need to pay attention to that.

Energy

A growing population is going to change the way we produce and consume energy. A big part of that is climate change. Texas has carved out a unique position on energy and greenhouse gas emissions. We’re a national leader in production but also responsible for emitting more carbon dioxide contributing to global warming. If we were our own country, we’d be seventh or eighth [in the world in terms of greenhouse gas emissions].

At the same time, apart from our unique position, we’re the last bastion where leaders blindly deny it is a problem. Here is the rub: we are in danger of being left behind as Washington and the rest of the world weigh solutions to decrease emissions and revolutionize their economies. We ought to be taking steps to ensure that we are at the table as we discuss and debate the solutions for decreasing emissions but also as we revolutionize our economy so it can lead us out of any economic downturn. That can have a transformative impact.

Higher education and dealing with clean energy can have a transformative impact on our economy; it can lead us out of an economic downturn. Yet, we’re frozen.

Visionary Budgeting; CHIP

Part of being in an economic downturn is that we need to be making careful budget decisions. But, we need to stop making budget decisions that only do short term savings that cost us far more over a longer period of time. Everyone wants to talk about fiscal austerity, but it is false fiscal austerity. The best example is the Children’s Health Insurance Program [CHIP]. There is a lot of discussion over health care and health insurance being a right. Future Texans will find that question to be as absurd as if public schools should be separate but equal or whether or not women should be allowed to vote.

It is shocking to me that kids with no control over their parents’ circumstances don’t have access to health care. Set aside compassion, and look at the economics: if you give me a dollar of state money, I can get you back $2.60 from the federal government. It is a guaranteed return on our investment. We should take that money and plow it into existing jobs in Texas. Hospitals, health care clinics–that we are told by economists becomes seven dollars in the economy on our return investment.

As we go into an economic downturn, more and more people will be in a situation where they will not have health care coverage. If we provide more money through the CHIP program for health care, property taxes stay lower, and that also decreases insurance premium rates.

There are some that will say that in an economy that is in a downturn, that isn’t the time to do this. That’s no excuse. That is the argument in favor of fully funding CHIP in my view. It is a compassionate program that keeps kids health. It is a conservative program in that it insures that relatively small maladies don’t become big illnesses. I don’t know why leaders and budget writers let it go by. It is precisely because we may be going into rough economic waters that we must be smart. Getting back that federal money guarantees a return on state dollars. Put that in attracting business, reduce insurance and property tax growth, you could go on and on and on. Now is the time to push those things.

On College Tuition Increases/Tuition Re-Regulation

This is a difficult situation. It is a sentiment makes all the sense in the world. Remember how we got here, though. Why we got here was that the state was shrinking what it was giving to higher education. The state shrunk its contribution, demeaning our institutions of higher education and, instead of stepping up and doing what we need to to properly fund them, it was decided to allow for increases in tuition. Then, by the way, many of the leadership acted like they were surprised tuition went up. The difference is that if the state doesn’t make up that difference and freezes tuition, even if the state keeps up with inflation on its part, we’ve got to keep up with inflation on the tuition part as well. It is a long way of saying that the state, if what we want to do is stop increases in tuition, is that the state must do its appropriate role. What I worry is that if the state doesn’t do that, and freezes tuition, then we bite off our nose to spite our face. I’m for making sure we have the best tuition rates we can possibly have and keeping the pressure on the state to provide appropriate funding for higher education. I worry that we need to take great crare if we do something on the freeze, to do something commensurate to increase state funding.