AUSTIN – The Texas Public Policy Foundation issued the following statement on the Texas Legislature’s passage of Senate Joint Resolution 1:
“SJR 1 puts in motion a plan to raid the Economic Stabilization Fund (ESF) for billions to pay for water infrastructure projects, an expense that should have been paid for within the existing General Revenue framework,” said Director of the Center for Fiscal Policy Talmadge Heflin, “There is ample funding in General Revenue for these projects, and fiscally responsible policy would have accounted for that.”
“The constitutional mechanism the Legislature has engaged to spend ESF funds is deeply troubling,” said Vice President for Policy Chuck DeVore, “and an apparent effort to circumvent the state’s spending cap now and in future budgets.”
The Honorable Talmadge Heflin is Director of the Center for Fiscal Policy at the Texas Public Policy Foundation. Heflin served 11 terms in the Texas House of Representatives and chaired the House Appropriations Committee in 2003, leading the Texas Legislature’s successful efforts to close a $10 billion budget deficit without a tax increase.
The Honorable Chuck DeVore is the Vice President for Policy at the Texas Public Policy Foundation. He served six years in the California Assembly and is the author of “The Texas Model: Prosperity in the Lone Star State and Lessons for America.”
The Texas Public Policy Foundation is a non-profit, free-market research institute based in Austin.
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