Republicans in the legislature are urging Governor Vilsack to use his authority to cut the state budget across the board to deal with the problem.House Speaker Christopher Rants, a Republican from Sioux City, says an across-the-board cut treats all of state government equally. Rants says it’s the “quickest and easiest thing to do” but if the Governor rejects that option, the Legislature will make other, selected cuts. Rants suggests a three-and-a-half percent across-the-board cut in the state budget, which would amount to just under 160-million dollars. House Appropriations Committee chairman Bill Dix, a Republican from Shell Rock, says it’s time to freeze state worker pay, and it’s time to quit trying to spend every dollar that comes in the door. Dix says Iowa is at risk of getting into a financial crisis like the one in California if the state continues to spend down to the bottom line. Rants says this latest round of state financial woe shows there are underlying problems in the Iowa economy. Rants says when national indicators seem to show the economy’s picking up, it’s troubling to see that Iowa’s not part of that.
