How to Fix an Overspending Problem: Lessons from the Washington Gubernatorial Race

Earlier This week, Washington State gubernatorial candidate Dino Rossi (R) called for a Constitutional Amendment to cap increases in state spending. Rossi’s proposal comes amidst news that the state overspent by $2.7 billion this year under Gov. Christine Gregoire (D).

Rossi’s spending cap is nothing new to Washingtonians: a similar measure, Initiative 601, was approved by voters back in 1993. I-601’s primary purpose was to limit state spending based on inflation and population growth, thus helping to keep the tax burden in check, and to require a 2/3 vote by the legislature to pass any tax increases.

For nearly a decade, I-601 cut the growth rate of state spending in half. But then in 2002 and 2005, greedy tax and spend lawmakers brushed aside their constituents’ mandate to limit the growth of government and passed amendments to the law that nullified the supermajority requirement. This permitted the governor and legislators to boost state spending and pass $400 million in tax hikes. (It has also prompted an ongoing lawsuit against the legislature from taxpayers who argue that legislators skirted certain portions of the law.)

Under Governor Gregoire’s administration, state spending has now increased by $8 billion or 33%, far above years when I-601 was in effect. While Gregoire has still not fully acknowledged this spending problem, Rossi has rightly stated that “the first thing everyone needs to understand about the deficit is that we have a spending problem, not a revenue problem.” Dino Rossi’s proposed Constitutional Amendment would nip this spending problem in the bud by preventing legislators from simply amending I-601 whenever they have the urge to spend someone else’s money.