The Business Council is presenting the case against a proposed constitutional amendment in a 29 page slideshow, available through www.hightaxesnewyork.com, the Council’s Web page designed to inform people about the dangers of the amendment.

The slide show agrees that some reform of the budget process is necessary.

“Our taxes and debt are worst in the nation (or close to it) – by almost every ranking,” the first slide says. “That’s smothering our state’s job growth. There’s a looming deficit. Yet every year Albany creates an even bigger hole for itself. There’s an endless cycle of spending, debt, and taxes – followed by crises and cutbacks. And the budget is chronically late.”

However the Legislature’s idea of a “solution” to New York’s problems poses several problems of its own, the slide show says. It would “snuff out the law that holds up their pay when the budget is late,” and “give legislators an incentive never to pass the budget on time – by giving them unprecedented control of the process, only if they’re late.”

It would also allow the final budget to be drafted in secret and bypass the requirement for a balanced budget.

The show also notes that while legislators tout the amendment as a solution to an onetime budget, lawmakers were able to pass on time budgets for 50 years under the current system, before being unable to meet the deadline for the past 20.

“It’s politics – not the state Constitution – that explains the difference,” the show says. “They can pass an on-time budget whenever they’re willing to. And in fact they did just that this year – without this constitutional amendment!”

The show says New York’s real problem is not the budget- it’s the spending.

“State and local spending in New York is 43 percent above the national average – higher than any state except Alaska,” it says. “Which makes our taxes highest in the nation – 48 percent above average (per capita) And debt is over $10,000 per person – 75 percent above average.”

And New York doesn’t need to spend that much to fill its own needs, the show says.

“A study by the Federal Reserve found that: New York’s ‘tax effort’ is about 43 percent above average,” it says. “But our ‘needs’ (poverty, etc.) are only 1 percent above average.”

Few studies show better results for all that, the show says. For instance, our Medicaid program spends much more than twice the national average – but our percentage of poor mothers receiving pre-natal care is below the national average

The slide show argues that the proposed amendment will only worsen New York’s spending problem.

The constitutional budget process is framed in such a way that the executive branch holds much of the budget power because the governor is the only elected official accountable to the entire state, the show says.

“Why did the framers assign the job to the governor?” the show asks. “Legislators thought of the budget not as a ‘budget,’ but as one spending item at a time. Each one focused on the items he or she wanted. If the budget didn’t balance, each one figured that was because of the other legislators’ items!

Somebody had to see the whole picture, the show says. Nobody could do that but the governor.

The same situation exists today, the show says. “Almost everybody legislators talk to urges them to spend more money. That’s the core message they hear from constituents. Albany harbors a $200 million industry of lobbyists and PACs that pound home the message: SPEND, SPEND! SPEND!”

We need our constitutional safeguards, the show adds.

This “reform” is of Albany, by Albany and for Albany, the show concludes. “The only losers will be the people. The only way of stopping it is – the people.”