AUGUSTA, Maine — After taking a break last year from endorsing state borrowing for public projects, Maine lawmakers on Thursday began considering a list of more than two-dozen bond issue proposals totaling nearly $600 million.
The Appropriations Committee began two days of public hearings on the borrowing proposals, which call for projects ranging from highway and rail line improvements to global seafood marketing. The largest, which came up Thursday, calls for $200 million to build a privately operated container port on Sears Island.
Last year, the Legislature decided not to ask voters to approve any borrowing in an effort to chip away at the state’s debt load. While lawmakers this session are considering the possibility, there’s no guarantee any borrowing proposals will pass in the Legislature.
According to the state treasurer’s office, Maine had $520 million in general obligation bond debt as of June 30. Tax-supported debt per capita is $865, much lower than the national median of $1,066, the treasury says.
The Appropriations Committee’s House Chairman, Rep. Patrick Flood, said the committee will review all of the proposals and consult with legislative leaders to see whether any new borrowing is called for. If any bond package emerges at all, it will be much smaller than the total now on the table, said the Winthrop Republican.
Any bond package would likely appear in no more than three or four bills, said Flood. The committee would let the governor take the lead if he decides to submit a package, he added.
Gov. Paul LePage is not actively considering a bond package but “the door’s slightly ajar,” said his spokeswoman, Adrienne Bennett.
“We still have a significant chunk of the budget to deal with. The governor believes we need to be in a healthy fiscal state before we take on more debt,” said Bennett.
Democrats have called for a bond package, which they say would create jobs and help revitalize the state’s economy.
The nonprofit GrowSmart Maine testified Thursday in favor of four of the bills before the committee, saying the state would benefit from the strategic use of bonding for economic development, research, infrastructure improvements and conservation.
The largest, $100 million, would provide funds for transportation, land protection, and the University of Maine System and the Maine Community College System to train people who want careers in the tourism industry.
Among the other groups submitting testimony was the Gulf of Maine Research Institute in favor of $1 million in bonds to complete the renovation of the wharf and bulkhead at its site in Portland Harbor.
The sheep will vote for every one of them.
There will be the concept of matching funds introduced, new jobs and how we need to maintain our infrastructure. When less and less people pay taxes or don’t have a dog in the fight they will say spend spend spend.
Does this prove that your economic policies… tax cuts AND balance the budget has failed, Governah ?
Is the only answer on the Left to raise taxes and spend. Have you ever had to live on a budget as the concept seems absent in virtually all of your posts.
Doesn’t this article prove the right has no answers at all, yet ?
I guess you have zero concept of a budget unless of course its involving other peoples money.
Most people on the Left are limited by arithmetic as you folks are artsy and not into science and math.
NO, NO , NO .. AND NO. The mirrors are already shattered and when the toxic smoke clears we will comprehend the massive debt Maine as already accumulated and we need a direction change to pay down the existing overhang of debt before hunting for more colorful Easter eggs, We’re entering whacko land now – Seat belts fastened, chairs in upright position, head down – your seat cushion is also a life preserver.
We are headed for the BIG crash !
My State Senator, who at the time was a Representative said this-
We put out bonds as an alternative for funding things that we should have funded with tax revenue in the first place or could be funded with reductions in spending from other areas. the average voter does not make the connection we are borrowing money that has to be paid back with interest.
The Maine Maritime Academy spent $1.4 million for a 6 acre 14 room mansion for it’s president to wine and dine and call home from it’s share of 2007 education bond traunch.
That is true, because people see bond issues on the ballot , they for some reason that i will never understand feel that its free money from the feds !
Gee, can I borrow $200,000,000 from the state? I promise to do something good with it.
Read my lips: NO MORE BONDS!
It states that the legislature is proposing bonds. One should not vote for bond borrowing–there is always a payday. Cutting spending is necessary on our state level, and even more evident on the national level.
Insanity is balancing the budget with Tax Cuts!
It’s like Quiting your Job because you don’t have enough money to pay the light bill!
Equating forcibly taking money from people with a job. You can’t make this stuff up.
I suppose you could come to the conclusion you were using to much electricity and cut back on the use of it. Then your bill wouldnt be so high and then with the left over money you could finance something more worthy. Perhaps you could fix your roof without having to take out a second mortage?
That being said I agree with you somewhat. Tax Cuts and a reduction in spending have to happen in order for things to work. Bush failed to understand that when he cut taxes but borrowed money to cover the spending. Obama seems to not be picking up on the concept that well either.
Here’s an idea for job creation. Have prisoners in Maine work on the roads. they can be monitored with officers on horses. Engineers can make sure that the roads are being constructed correctly. A drop in rations if someone purposely screws up in order to get back ” at the man”. i have been seeing alot of repeat offenderd in the news lately. Sounds like some people need more of a purpose in their lives.
oh never mind, it would be inhumane to treat these poor unfortunate victims of society in such a manner.
What a joke! They want to borrow $600 million for projects, but on the main page they say that revenues are down $14 million. So, I guess it’s time to get out the credit card again! If the government was forced to live on a budget like most working class people, they would drop like flies. That’s why it’s important to keep millionaires in government. They understand working class people.
Land Protection??? Not one more dime for them… Angus started that mess years ago and said it would only cost 150 millon, Every year the freaks come out and want to covet more private property… Every year we here the same thing from the Dems about bonding will create jobs—– Every year bonding has created jobs for the same people who the bonding created jobs for the previous year.. And all the bullcrap about for every dollar spent it creates 6 dollars in the private sector is bull also.. If it were true then the billion plus we spend on welfare every year would create 6 billion in the private sector…
Searsport needs a cosigner not corporate welfare on the taxpayers backs..$200,000.000 ???
Bonding is really borrowing money you dont have. Mortage, Car Loans, Student Loan Borrowing are all types of Bonds in some ways. And yet we have seen what happens when people get carried away with mortages, remortaging,(securing more bonding).
The bonds questions are written in such a way as to promise everything to everyone. They dont print much about the fact it is borrowed money that has to be paid for! I can get a credit card with a 10000 dollar limit tomorrow and max it out by renovating my home. I stimulate the economy by hiring a local carpenter and buying goods at the local EBS. Money I “borrow or bond” is spent to the benefit of many. That doesnt mean that I can afford to pay even the minimum balance per month on that credit card though and if I am not careful I can have a new bathroom but some serious credit and finance problems.
Now take this to the level of half a billion dollars and you see the potential for serious trouble to occur.
The real question should be, Who proposed these Bonds.
What ties do they have to where the money is going?
PORK!!! PORK!!! PORK!!! is alive and well and they are not ashamed!
Didn’t he say he wasn’t going to borrow anymore?
He has proven himself in not being able to balance a budget with his coming short 14 million again.. How is he gonna pay for this bond? What does he want to do cut the taxes, cut all revenue so he has to actually cut public assistance programs? Bet he goes and cuts schools too, But not the private ones he sends them money!!!
An obvious question is, has there been a market study behind a proposed $200 million bond for a private cargo port on Sears Island. Amazingly, the answer is no.
But there’s a far better indication of the foolishness of having we the public pick up an enormous bill on behalf of private speculators for an unneeded container port on what happens to be the largest entirely wild island along the East Coast of the U.S. that yet remains in the hands of we the public. In 2007, after effectively manipulating a portion of Maine’s environmental organizations and land trusts into a grumbling state of compliance, the Baldacci Administration proceeded not with a marketing plan but with a real-life experiment in outright marketing.
Long before our present governor started to stamp and blow about the need to be friendly to business, Baldacci spent at least a quarter-million taxpayer dollars sending out feelers around the world letting it be known that the State of Maine was wide open to seeing about half this beautiful and now rare island clearcut and paved over with highway and rail lines in service to a container port.
Setting aside the not unsubstantial issue of the environmental devastation entailed in such insanity, critics of Baldacci’s plan — including many in the industry — had warned there was little evidence for the economic viability of such a project. In fact, all the so-called evidence in favor amounted to little more than the make-work pipedreams of careerists in state government and the phony projections of some people at RailWorld Inc. in Chicago. These blowhards from the Windy City were the same shrewd speculators who a few years earlier had snapped up the rusted assets of the bankrupt Bangor and Aroostook Railroad and looked to a publicly funded hogfeed at Sears Island as yet another opportunity to avail themselves of corporate welfare. (So far, they’ve had to settle for the $22 million we the public gave them last year so we the public could enjoy the benefits of owning and maintaining the least profitable half of their trackage, all of it that serves Aroostook County.)
And, back to Baldacci’s now nearly five-year-old experiment in marketing a Sears Island cargo port, what was the response? To this day there has not been even a nibble.