Lingle hacks UH Gov. Linda Lingle has slashed more than half of the proposed $1 billion in construction projects earmarked in the Cayetano administration's two-year state budget, with the University of Hawaii taking the brunt of the cuts.
building budget
Her budget proposal calls
for cutting more than half
of the construction projectsBy Pat Omandam
pomandam@starbulletin.comOverall, of the $573.8 million in cuts to the proposed construction budget, $278 million were for UH projects, including $171.3 million for the new Kapolei campus for the University of Hawaii-West Oahu. The cuts also include a $62.4 million student life and events complex at UH-Hilo, a $13.9 million UH Center at West Hawaii, and $6 million to renovate and for an addition to Sinclair Library on the Manoa campus.
"It just seems like the UH is bearing the brunt of the CIP (capital improvement project) adjustments, and it just raises a lot of questions," said Rep. Scott Nishimoto (D, Kaimuki-McCully), a former UH-Manoa student body president.
Budget Director Georgina Kawamura, in a 90-minute briefing before the House Finance Committee yesterday, said the university had more than $500 million in construction requests over the next two years, and that is why it received the most cuts.
"And I guess in light of the fiscal condition right now, we just thought it wasn't prudent to go ahead and expand on more," Kawamura said.
State Rep. Mark Moses (R, Kapolei) said funding for construction of the new campus is not needed right away until new roads and a highway offramp are completed in 2005.
Former Gov. Ben Cayetano had proposed $1 billion construction budgets to past Legislatures, but that amount was always scaled down by lawmakers.
Meanwhile, House Finance Chairman Dwight Takamine (D, Hilo-Hamakua) and other majority members of the panel were frustrated yesterday over the lack of details and missed deadlines in the Lingle administration's proposed "no growth" state budget of $7.46 billion for next fiscal year.
By law the governor's proposed budget was to have been submitted to the Legislature last December. But the deadline was pushed back until last month because of a change to a new Republican administration from 40 years of Democrat control.
House Finance members, however, said they are anxious for details as legislative deadlines approach.
"What I'm dealing with right now is people coming into my office asking us for money," said Rep. Tommy Waters (D, Waimanalo). "But I can't tell them what we're going to do because we don't really know what's on the table and what's off the table yet."
Kawamura reassured the panel specific operating budget figures for all the state departments except Education and UH -- which need their respective board approvals first -- should be ready by Tuesday.
Takamine said with just a few weeks left before all bills must be sent to their final committees, he needs details if the House is to send the Senate a balanced budget at midsession.
"It's just that when we leave the deadlines open-ended, it just makes things a little nervous," Takamine said.
In her update yesterday, Kawamura said the executive budget proposes transferring to the state general fund $29.4 million from 20 special funds, while an additional $5.4 million in each year could be gained through a repeal of exemptions to departmental administrative expenses.
Overall, Kawamura said, the administration's two-year budget seeks $84.4 million in spending restrictions, mostly through a 5 percent spending freeze on all departments and agencies.
She added that cuts in the two-year construction budget would allow the state to save $800,000 in debt savings or interest next year, and $3.8 million in 2005. Nevertheless, Waters lamented the removal of $18.6 million in improvements to the Waimanalo Wastewater Treatment Plant that are needed before the state can transfer the facility to the city.
Kawamura said that construction project will just have to remain on hold. But she reminded Waters that the Legislature decides what gets included in the state budget, not the administration.
"It's in your hands," she said.