Up now in the House Ways and Means: The budget

Tune into TVW now to hear the House discuss the budget — here’s a link to all 200-some pages.

Right now, they’re running through amendments. I’ll update here should the discussion heat up.

Up now: Rep. Jeannie Darneille’s amendment to close the state ethics board. She said in 2009, their nearly $500,000 budget resulted in 11 state employees getting a slap on the wrist for inappropriate use of the internet. She said those “inappropriate uses” included saving a home mortgage on their work computer. She said this is a difficult time in the state and she couldn’t justify spending $500,000 on 11 employees.

Rep. Kelli Linville asked if Darneille to clarify whether the ethics board was the same one that oversaw legislators. Darneille said it was not.

Rep. Larry Seaquist said he thought it actually increased the oversight because right now, it’s too easy for state managers to toss problems to the ethics board. He said defunding it would force people to take more responsibility.

But Rep. Bill Hinkle said he’s not sure that cutting the budget for the ethics board would be the right thing to do. He said it would send the wrong message.

The amendment was adopted. There was some discussion about the board being “scalable” — so maybe they’ll cut it partially and not fully.

Tags: Budget