Governor to support regulatory capture
Ed Vogel reports today on a proposal to have the gaming industry fund the Gaming Control Board's $63 million budget directly. MGM Mirage spokesman Alan Feldman's comments appear to be supportive of the idea and who's surprised? What regulated industry would not want to exert greater control over the agency charged with regulating it?
The governor's spokesman, Dan Burns, indicated that "the governor would support any fees, taxes or revenue increases that are backed by the affected businesses."
Doubtlessly, lawmakers are pushing this idea because they're trying to shake down everyone they can for money. However, regardless of the state's fiscal position, this is simply bad public policy. This proposal would create a huge potential for regulatory capture.
The solution that should be explored for the upcoming special session, but so far has not been, is to pare back inflation-adjusted, per capita state spending to levels that existed just six years ago. It seems that lawmakers and the governor are willing to implement what is obviously bad policy in order to avoid cutting back the growth in spending.
Once again, had TASC been in place, there would be no shortfall! Lawmakers created this crisis.
