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TaxWatch List Pecks At 'Turkeys'

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By CATHERINE DOLINSKI

The Tampa Tribune

Published: May 31, 2008

Updated: 05/31/2008 12:14 am

TALLAHASSEE - The Tampa Bay area's transportation authority appeared Friday on Florida TaxWatch's list of "budget turkeys," raising the specter of a possible funding veto for a second straight year.

The $2 million that lawmakers set aside for the transportation authority is just one of the 133 appropriations that TaxWatch is asking the governor to veto this month. The private, nonpartisan watchdog group, funded mostly by businesses, has been releasing lists of "turkeys" since 1983 to highlight appropriations that wound up in the budget without going through the normal legislative process.

All told, this year's turkey list for 2008-09 totals $110.5 million, well shy of the $256 million identified after last year's spring legislative session. TaxWatch president Dominic Calabro said he was hoping that, in a shortfall year when lawmakers shrank education, public safety and other vital areas of the state budget by $4 billion, there would be no turkeys at all.

"These are items that circumvented the established and normal budgeting process at a time when core services were cut, and fees were increased," he said.

Most, though not all, of the items are requests made by members to support local projects in their districts. Calabro stressed that the "turkey" label is not meant to disparage a project's worth, only the process by which it was approved.

For example, turkeys may have been added late in the process during the final budget conference, mandate spending on a specific vendor or draw from an inappropriate source of funds.

Other local items that appear on the turkey list:

•$5 million for economic development in Pasco County (reason: added in conference)

•$300,000 for the Hillsborough Association of Retarded Citizens (reason: added in conference)

•$125,000 for the Florida Holocaust Museum in Pinellas County (reason: added in conference)

•$100,000 for the Connections Job Development Program in Pasco County (reason: does not meet "critical criteria for funding"; governor recommended against it)

•$75,000 for an economic and transportation development study of Tampa's impoverished District 59 (reason: not recommended by the governor or any agency)

Vetoing these and other so-called turkeys, Calabro said, "will help protect the states' reserve funds and further ensure that the people do not experience further unnecessary reductions in core services that might jeopardize their health, welfare, safety, or education, or suffer crippling tax increases in the near future."

Projects On Last Year's List Vetoed

In 2007, Gov. Charlie Crist vetoed 60 percent of the appropriations panned by TaxWatch.

The Tampa Bay Area Regional Transportation Authority escaped the turkey list that year, but Crist vetoed funding for the project anyway, even as he approved the bill creating it.

If the authority does not receive funding again this year, it risks missing the 2009 deadline that lawmakers set for completion of a regional transportation master plan connecting Tampa Bay's seven counties, said Rep. Bill Galvano, R-Bradenton.

The authority was created not just to plan, but to execute such plans for mass transit and other modes of transportation for the region. Another budget veto "would keep the TBRTA from being a serious entity," Galvano said. "Instead it will be viewed as a tool of the Department of Transportation. DOT's been a great partner ... but the value of the authority is that it can act on its own, based on the input of the communities."

Other items on TaxWatch's turkey list this year include $375,000 for a "rail feasibility study" of the Bay area, requested by Sen. Mike Fasano, R-New Port Richey.

Fasano wants a thorough study of rail options for the area, he said, to avoid the kind of "mess" that has erupted over the state's one-half billion dollar deal with CSX to bring light-rail to Central Florida.

"That was done, some of it, behind closed doors, in such a way that many people say they knew nothing about it," he said. "There's been a lot of talk ... about the possibility of bringing commuter rail to the Tampa Bay area, and I wanted a public study to know exactly what the impact would be."

Another of Fasano's priorities on the list is $5 million for economic development in Pasco County.

TaxWatch analyst Kurt Wenner said that one was a tough call, because the state Office of Tourism and Economic Development has indicated that it may want to invest in Pasco. But the earmark wound up on the list because it is vague, reserving those dollars exclusively for one county, but without specifying a single project.

Fasano argued that the earmark pulls from a pot of money in the state budget reserved specifically for luring businesses and creating jobs, and that the county would still have to match the grant funding in order to get it.

"I find it hard to believe why TaxWatch, a supposedly reputable organization that pushes for lower taxes and creation of good jobs, would be opposed to any incentive" to create jobs during difficult economic times, he said.

Fasano Ticked At TaxWatch

Riled by TaxWatch's complaint that the appropriation did not go through normal budgeting channels, Fasano said, "TaxWatch doesn't have a clue how the process works. I didn't see TaxWatch at any of our committee meetings voicing concerns about any of our projects. I did not see anyone from TaxWatch during conference ... It's an organization paid with corporate dollars to watch over special interest dollars and tax exemptions. So I really don't care what TaxWatch believes."

Crist spokesman Sterling Ivey said the governor had just received the budget from the Legislature on Friday and has until July 14 to act on it. Crist has already indicated that he will sign it and has relatively few objections to its particulars.

"The governor will consider the ideas and input of staff, legislators and Floridians across the state who have contacted him in the course of this session to encourage his action on this budget," Ivey said.

Reporter Catherine Dolinski can be reached at (850) 222-8382 or cdolinski@tampatrib.com.

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