A Citizen's Guide to Indiana

Advance Indiana has an interesting post up about St. Joseph County’s accusations that the Dept. of Local Government Finance is playing politics with the certification of budgets. According to an article in the South Bend Tribune, St. Joe officials say of the DLGF:

They accused the DLGF of “holding St. Joseph County tax rates hostage since July, resulting in hundreds of millions of tax dollars going uncollected, increasing taxpayer anxiety and frustration, and costing cash-starved local governmental units tens of thousands of dollars in borrowing costs.”

St. Joseph County compared the DLGF’s requirements to “Whack-A-Mole”. Every time they would submit something, the Department would ask for something more and delay approving the budget. One of the things that held up this year’s budget request was parcel data for taxes payable in 2008.

[St. Joseph County Auditor] Eby said he couldn’t understand why data for next year would hold up taxes for this year.

“That’s just beside the point,” [DLGF Commissioner] Musgrave said.

The three [St. Joseph County] officials pointed out that some counties, including Elkhart County, received their tax rates early, then got letters in August saying they were out of compliance in some areas. If that could be done in Elkhart County, they wondered, why couldn’t it be done in St. Joseph County?

What is the political upside to holding up approval of a budget? South Bend mayor Stephen Luecke faces a tough election against a conservative Republican candidate. Delaying budget approval means that tax bills could be held up so that they had to go out right before the election. And, let’s face it, Gov. Daniels has taken pleasure in making St. Joseph County his whipping boy throughout his term — that’s the origin of his gubernatorial opponent, Gov. Kernan and House Speaker, Rep. Bauer. Daniels went so far as to illegally oppose St. Joseph County’s request to move to the Central Time Zone — the only county request he opposed. St. Joseph County was also directly affected by the Toll Road sale. So, for us paranoid types, this could just be more of the same.

Governor Daniels discussed some details of the State’s new health plan. The State will start signing people up in December and the plan is to begin coverage in January.

Adults who don’t have access to employer-sponsored health insurance and have family incomes up to 200 percent of the federal poverty level qualify for the program. That’s a limit of $41,300 for a family of four, or $20,420 for a single adult.

. . .

$500 in free preventive care, such as prostate checks or smoking cessation programs.

A $1,100 annual health-care account funded by the participant with help from the state for lower-income adults. The account would be used to cover health-care costs not considered preventive care.

A more traditional insurance plan with no deductibles or co-pays that kicks in after the health account is exhausted. Coverage would be capped at $300,000 annually per participant or $1 million over a participant’s lifetime.

I thought this was a pretty insightful comment by Ken Burns while promoting his new documentary, The War:

As we know from Iraq, as we know from the Peloponnesian wars, the experience of war is essentially the same: I was scared, I was bored, I was hot, I was cold, my officers didn’t know what they were doing, I didn’t get the right equipment, I saw bad things, I did bad things, I lost good friends. It’s been the same since the beginning of human history and it will be, I’m sorry to say, the same until human beings are no more.

Mike Smith, writing for the Associated Press, has an article about new rules adopted by the Indiana Gaming Commission and the Indiana Horse Racing Commission that might be considered an usurpation of the General Assembly’s authority to control gambling in Indiana. The gaming commission adopted new rules that allows casinos to become more like buildings and less like boats. State law requires the building to be boats and not barges, though the General Assembly has considered allowing casinos to operate on barges, for a small fee of course.

Legislators have considered allowing barges in the past in exchange for major fees but have not done so. But Pelath said the expanding casinos fit his description of a barge.

“A barge is what a barge does, which is sit there and be real big,” he said. “And whether you strap a motor onto the back of it, it doesn’t make it not a barge.”

I love that explanation about barges. With respect to the Horse Racing Commission

Some lawmakers also are irked at emergency rules adopted by the Indiana Horse Racing Commission and gaming commission that require the state to consider seeking money or other benefits before allowing ownership interests to be sold.

. . .

Yelton said he agreed with Daniels’ philosophy behind the rules — that the state should benefit if a casino or track owner makes a significant profit for selling its ownership in a license that allowed it to make great sums of money.
But Sen. Lindel Hume, D-Princeton, said it was “on the borderline of extortion.” And Pelath said it violated legislative powers.
“I’m absolutely certain we didn’t delegate taxing authority to the gaming commission, and it wouldn’t even be constitutional if we did,” he said.

Gov. Daniels should probably consider running for the General Assembly – he really, really seems to enjoy legislative power.