Going lean: legislative staff are being cut around the country, but some lawmakers worry the fiscal trims are going too far.

• Author: Greenblatt, Alan

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Time is money, and Jay Emler is worried the Kansas Legislature is running out of both.

Governor Mark Parkinson, as part of his plan to erase a $400 million shortfall, has proposed cutting the Legislature's operating budget by 9.4 percent or $2.8 million. That would come on top of an 8.9 percent hit the Legislature took last year.

"If we do that, I believe we will not have enough money to actually fund the 90-day session." said Emler. who chairs the Senate Ways and Means Committee, as the session got underway. "We won't be able to get our job done because we won't have enough money to pay our staff or ourselves, for that matter. It would give us only 83 days."

Emler points out that it wouldn't be so terrible for the Legislature to adjourn a week early, were it not for the fact that lawmakers are going to need the extra time to grapple with the state's continuing budget shortfalls. In the end, lawmakers cut their own pay, but restored about $550,000 to the legislative budget--enough to pay for roughly 88 days.

It's a dilemma many legislatures are starting to face--again. It's also clear legislatures need to share the pain they've been imposing on the rest of state government. But some legislative staff also think it's possible that, by cutting their own budgets too deeply, they've been pursuing a false economy.

"If anything, during these times you have to make sure you have enough staff to handle the challenges," says Lorne Malkiewich, director of the Nevada Legislative Counsel Bureau. It has 30 vacant staff positions and the Legislature grappled with a $900 million budget shortfall for the current biennium. "That's the quandary we as a state find ourselves in."

THE BIGGEST LOSER

Some legislatures have seen steeply increased budgets in recent years or have enjoyed major capital improvement programs that spruced up their own quarters. But as legislators now look for savings, they have not hesitated to cut their own budgets. Many legislative chambers have reduced operating expenses by as much as 30 percent. So far, the cuts have mostly been in hiring and salary freezes, as well as reductions in areas such as out-of-state travel.

Legislators and their staffs have, for the most part, managed to make do. "My staff has really stepped up to fill the gap," says Mitchell Bean, director of the Michigan House Fiscal Agency.

But in addition to people feeling stretched, Bean says there are consequences to having lost 15 percent of his staff positions over the past year. "There...