There were no surprises to be found when Gov. Haley Barbour and the Legislative Budget Committee released their budget proposals.

Barbour’s budget holds to a strict 5 percent cut for most departments, underfunds the Mississippi Adequate Education Program and seeks more executive control of state agencies.

The LBC proposal cuts funding for many agencies, fully funds MAEP but stops short of explaining new sources of revenue. One legislator called the LBC proposal a &8220;rough draft,&8221; adding the details would be hammered out in the regular session.

While the governor’s budget proposal is routinely dismissed by the Legislature, this year could be different. First, Barbour’s veto is sustainable in the Senate because of a solid block of Republicans who last session walked step-in-step with the governor. Second, the budget situation is so bad this year, the Legislature could conceivably pass much of Barbour’s budget and put the yoke on him for any of the negative publicity it generates.

When comparing the two budgets, it seems to boil down to this: the governor’s budget is fiscally sound but flawed in its approach to funding education and Medicaid. The LBC proposal is pie-in-the-sky budgeting without new sources of revenue defined. The drastic cuts to fund education and Medicaid simply won’t happen.

So, what is to be done? Compromise? Perhaps. If the House can convince the governor to accept fee increases, a tobacco tax or both.

Depending on whom you listen to on the tobacco tax increase, $1 per pack more could generate as much as $350 million at current sales levels. Conventional wisdom says and history dictates that when tobacco prices go up, sales go down. So the estimates range from $180 million to $130 million in realized revenue.

So, think of the good here. Even at $130 million, the shortfall for MAEP would be manageable. Second, the state would save money on health care-related services because the number of cigarettes purchased in the state would drop by more than 50 percent. It’s a win-win situation.

Putting a figure on the amount of revenue realized from fee increases is harder, but when you consider some fees have not been raised in a decade but the price of providing services for those fees has steadily increased, a fee hike would not be unjustified.

So how do you get the governor to go along with these two proposals (if you do at all)? Give him what he wants: Compromise.

Perhaps a deal could be struck that trades the tax hike and fee increases for a few of Barbour’s pet ideas: giving executive directors of executive agencies the freedom Barbour seeks, funding agencies with lump sums and taking the $20 million for the Partnership for a Healthy Mississippi and putting it into legislative appropriations.

While PHMS seems like a sacred cow, perhaps it is time to send it to the slaughter, or at least trim it like everything else so as to help save Medicaid.

But whatever takes place, with the governor’s legislative clout in the Senate and the House’s strong populist approach, compromise will have to be the word of the day, or gridlock will ensue early.

Sam R. Hall

can be reached by e-mail to

shall@sctonline.net

.