Were Natural Resources Budgets Cut in the Final Budget?
May 26, 2011
One of the persistent claims of the environmental community this year was that natural resources budgets were taking big cuts. Now that the budget has been finalized, the numbers show Natural Resources agencies actually received a slight increase in their overall budget.
The budget increase is primarily due to a big increase for the Department of Fish and Wildlife in funding for Puget Sound efforts and money from the new "Discovery Pass" for parks.
Here are the major agencies and the changes for the next biennium:
| Total | 0.55% |
| Department of Ecology | -1.93% |
| Parks and Recreation Commission | -0.66% |
| State Conservation Commission | -4.03% |
| Department of Fish and Wildlife | 8.86% |
| Puget Sound Partnership | 4.92% |
| Department of Natural Resources | -3.72% |
| Department of Agriculture | 4.13% |
The total state budget will increase 3.3% for the 2011-13 Biennium.
Comments
Need to look at the fund sources
The figures you are using reflect all funds received by agencies - state general fund, dedicated revenue, and federal fund authority. When doing these comparisons you should keep this in mind. For example, at my agency (State Conservation Commission) we have an increase in federal fund authority but we don't even know if those funds will ever become available. Regardless, it shows up in our budget as in increase. Also, new fees such as the Discover Pass can also be deceptive. The budget assumes a certain amount will be raised by the fee, and these assumptions are in the budget as an increase. However, if the actual revenue is short of the estimate assumption, then the agency has to cut. State Parks currently has the $5 license fee but revenues from this are running about 60% of estimates. So Parks has to cut.
A better measure of comparison would be to look at the state general fund allocation for each agency. This would give you an idea of how much the state is spending in these agencies. By comparing the state general fund spending in these agencies the picture is different from what you show:
Ecology -11.7%
State Parks -5.6%
Recreation and Conservation Office -21.4%
State Conservation Commission -10.6%
Dept of Fish and Wildlife -9.7%
Puget Sound Partnership -15.1%
Dept of Natural Resources -13.9%
Dept of Agriculture -6.7%
Again, these figures represent state general fund dollars only and do not include new fees or dedicated accounts.
The Environment Doesn't Care About Fund Sources
I don't think this is a useful way to look at this. Fund sources are not relevant to the impact on the environment. If more money is being spent overall, the amount being spent by particular funds is irrelevant.
I do agree that the Discover Pass is unlikely to meet the revenue targets. At DNR, we decided not to charge a fee because the difficulty of collecting outweighed the potential revenue.
Ultimately, the squeeze on funds makes science-based prioritization even more important. Unfortunately, we are not making decisions based on a scientific assessment, but instead are wasting money on feel-good efforts that yield little benefit.
Terminology
I'm curious, are these cuts reductions over their current spending, or were they reductions in the increase for the new budget?
I ask, because I'm sure there is a mix, but it isn't always clear when the cut is a reduction of the size of increase and when it is actually a cut.
Cuts or "Cuts"?
The comparison is between the 2009-11 budget and the 2011-13 budget. Some will argue that the increase is less than the rate of inflation, making this a reduction. That is misleading, however, because we cannot predict inflation. Nor can we predict the supplemental budget, which could increase these numbers. So, I chose to simply compare the two budgets.