Republican Gov. Larry Hogan on Tuesday urged Democrats who control the legislature to pass a measure to reign in state spending mandates, but Democrats said Maryland’s governor already has strong budget powers to do that.
Hogan, who campaigned on bringing greater fiscal accountability to state spending, noted that 83 percent of Maryland’s budget is mandated. While the economy has improved, Hogan said the state is still vulnerable to serious financial problems in such unforeseen economic events as a federal government shutdown.
“This drives unsustainable spending and puts our budget on autopilot for massive spending increases that we simply can’t afford when times are tough,” Hogan said.
But Democrats pointed out that Maryland’s governor already has unusually strong powers to make sweeping cuts to mandated spending by submitting a companion spending bill with the governor’s budget plan. That’s what was done almost every year in the last decade during the recession and its aftermath.
“It changes policy,” said Del. Maggie McIntosh, a Baltimore Democrat who chairs the House Appropriations Committee. “It changes the budget. It brings the budget into balance, so that we pass — as we are constitutionally told to — a balanced budget every year.”