Independent candidate for governor Eliot Cutler’s proposal to restructure state government is an entertaining read. I laughed. I cried.
Its basic premise is that the people’s government can be made more efficient by just taking the people out of it. It concentrates power in the governor’s office at a time when Mainers are growing increasingly skeptical of governmental power.
Example: It proposes to create a new Office of Regulatory Review and Repeal within the governor’s office. However, regulatory policy is created by the legislative branch, not the executive. At best, this new bureaucracy could only propose changes — something the governor’s office can already do.
It proposes to abolish the Board of Environmental Protection — a citizens board — and replace it with an adjudicatory panel. But the board exists precisely to defend citizen involvement.
Historically, this is consistent with Mainers’ general mistrust of government. Voters have long preferred a weak Legislature: part-time and term-limited. Given that legislators are required to leave office just as they become sufficiently experienced, it is wise not to trust complex scientific decisions to the Legislature.
Nor have Mainers been comfortable leaving far-reaching decisions to the regulatory bureaucracy, and they are reluctant to trust an expedited process that diminishes citizen input, empowers the executive branch and favors the politically well-connected.
If candidate Cutler perceives a problem with the BEP, he might want to consider whether the trouble relates to inadequate resources or unclear statutory direction before proposing to reduce the role of citizens in their own government.
Cutler’s proposal also recommends the removal of authority from the
Land Use Regulation Commission — another citizens board — by transferring power to the executive branch. I’ve served on study groups that pondered similar ideas, and I find some merit in the suggestion. Frankly, I’ve considered ideas more sweeping than Cutler’s. However, Cutler supports his proposal by perpetuating a
deeply flawed talking point — that the LURC decision on Plum Creek was too long and too costly.
In reality, LURC was perfectly capable of delivering a quick answer on the Plum Creek proposal. And the answer would have been “no.” Even many proponents admit that the original plan was too dispersed in too many sensitive places and offered too little in return to Maine citizens for the immense rezoning windfall being re-quested.
It was Plum Creek, not LURC, that withdrew and reworked the proposal multiple times. It took time, money and citizen involvement to get the proposal to the point where LURC could actually say “yes.”
Given that this was the largest development plan in state history, would Maine citizens really agree to a process that hastens the decision by cutting them out of it?
Some of Cutler’s other proposals have value, but here’s one that should be dead on arrival: a Base Realignment and Closure Commission type commission to review all state policies and agencies for potential elimination, chaired by the governor himself. Within a year it is to make a series of recommendations to the Legislature as a single package.
Under the proposal, the Legislature could not amend the package of recommendations. It could only vote yes or no.
Democracy and politics are messy. I’m sure a new governor would find it attractive to limit the power of the Legislature, but eliminating the participation of citizens or reducing the role of their elected representatives is not a sound basis for a restructuring plan.
I agree with Cutler that state government needs restructuring and the next governor will have to tackle it. However, the next governor should be prepared to work with the Legislature, not supersede it.
Cutler should be applauded for putting his plan on the table. Given that he has not lived in the state for most of his career and has no hands-on experience with state policy, the flaws in the scheme are understandable.
In November, it will be up to Maine voters to decide how much on-the-job training they can afford in a new governor before realistic proposals and genuine restructuring can take place.
Bob Duchesne, D-Hudson, represents District 13 in the Maine House. He is House chair of the Committee on Natural Resources, which has oversight over the Board of Environmental Protection.