Newspaper slams lawmakers over WAMs

The full details of the budget agreement reached Sept. 18 to end Pennsylvania's 80-day-old budget stalemate are slowing leaking out of Harrisburg, but we do know that Gov. Ed Rendell and the Legislature decided not touch their multi-million slush accounts known as "Walking Around Money" or WAMs.

The Philadelphia Inquirer says it's not fair that so many needed services have been cut from the budget while lawmakers get to keep their slush funds.

From an editorial in today's edition:

Budget negotiators have set aside at least $100 million for what's known as "walking-around money." WAMs are discretionary grants that individual lawmakers hand out to favored groups in their home districts with little justification and no accountability.

WAMs are also a great way for incumbents to help ensure their reelection. It's no coincidence that legislative leaders have made this honeypot available now - all 203 House seats and half of the 50 Senate seats are up for election next fall.

This legislature does not excel at much, but it is superb at looking out for itself. Legislators know there will be plenty of anti-incumbent sentiment at the polls next year.

Then there is the matter of the legislative leaders' "slush fund." The leaders of both parties in the House and Senate have been squirreling taxpayer dollars in these murky accounts for years.

No one will know how much money is in the slush fund until a new accounting is finished in December. In June 2008, the balance was about $200 million.

Read the full editorial, "Taking care of No. 1" at the newspaper's Web site