RALEIGH, N.C. – North Carolina State Auditor Beth Wood thinks former first lady Mary Easley’s university salary was too high but that her staff may have set the bar too low for the value of Easley’s work.

Wood released an interim report Thursday that her department performed examining whether Easley should have received $170,000 a year from North Carolina State University.

Report investigators calculated late last year that Easley should have received a $79,000 salary, but N.C. State officials disagreed.

Wood told reporters the school made some good points and the report had too many holes in it. She decided to put the final report on hold earlier this year, in part because federal prosecutors were now investigating activities surrounding Mary Easley and former Gov. Mike Easley.

Gov. Beverly Perdue is trying to expand on some old ideas to close a proposed $3.4 billion budget gap for North Carolina next year.

Her spending plan recommends more than $200 million in savings by giving agencies less than 100 percent of their expected allotment to pay workers.

State government usually spends a little less than 100 percent because it’s not always at full employment. A few percentage points are used to pay for temporary workers, unexpected high utility bills or workers compensation claims.

Perdue said it’s time to pull back that money to its actual use for regular salaries to give the public a more accurate picture of how taxpayer dollars are spent.

Legislative leaders are not thrilled with the idea, saying it gives wiggle room for agencies when money is tight.

WASHINGTON – Senate Democrats are trying to thwart a Republican effort to make lawmakers vote every year on whether or not to give themselves a pay raise.

For the past two decades, lawmakers have been receiving automatic cost-of-living increases each year unless they vote specifically to reject them. In January, they got an automatic increase of $4,700, boosting their annual salary to $174,000.

Republican Sen. David Vitter of Louisiana demanded a vote Tuesday on a measure that would do away with those automatic raises. He argued that they’re inappropriate while the nation is mired in a recession and millions of Americans have lost their jobs. Lawmakers aren’t contradicting that reasoning, but they are accusing Vitter of using the issue to delay a broader bill boosting government spending.

By MARSHA MERCER
Media General News Service

WASHINGTON – In his first month in office, President Barack Obama persuaded Congress to give out economic stimulus sweets totaling $787 billion.

Now, though, he may be poised to put the government on a long-term diet.

“We have to once again live within our means,” Obama told business leaders at the White House Feb. 13.
“We’re going to have to make some tough decisions that many of you are already making in your companies, but the federal government has not made.”

He makes it sound so reasonable.

But the federal government is unlike any other employer.

Exhibit A: a fellow named Bob Whitmore, who has been on paid administrative leave from the Labor Department since July 16, 2007.

That’s right. Whitmore, who makes $150,000 a year as director of record-keeping for the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, hasn’t worked a day since then while the government supposedly is investigating allegations of disruptive behavior.

Whitmore says he wants to work. He’s not a union member and could be fired.

You might think that once somebody in charge somewhere in the vast federal bureaucracy heard about

Whitmore, he or she would say, “This can not go on another day.” But you’d be wrong.

Writing about Whitmore in The Washington Post Thursday, columnist Joe Davidson noted that Whitmore testified last June to a House committee about his job situation. Whitmore also charged that the government allows companies to underreport injuries. That made a splash in newspapers and TV. And yet Whitmore is still sitting at home, getting paid.

Let’s stipulate that most people on the federal payroll go to work. And that the Whitmore case is highly unusual. And yet, it goes to a mindset that is as foreign to the business world as it is entrenched in government. The mindset makes it very difficult for anyone to bring real change to Washington.
The government plays with funny money. Oh, it’s real all right, but it just doesn’t seem real. That makes “living within our means” a remote concept.

No company would let such a situation like Whitmore’s drag on this long, paying someone to do nothing.

I read about Whitmore, saw a report that the federal deficit could reach nearly $2 trillion this year and then read that Obama is hosting a “fiscal responsibility summit” Monday.

Dozens of House members, senators and think-tank wonks from both parties and differing economic views will come to the White House to discuss the fiscal mess. On Tuesday, he will outline his budget priorities in his first, primetime address to a joint session of Congress.

And on Thursday Obama will send Congress his preliminary budget for 2010. Details aren’t expected until March or April.

The rollout of the new fiscal plan sounds well orchestrated, but the question is whether the president will be able to persuade members of Congress whose appetites have been whetted by stimulus sweets to accept the discipline of a new diet.

Obama has been unwavering in his belief that the country needs serious spending to get us out of the ditch. He also still says he wants to help millions of the uninsured get health care.

He also believes it’s important to think beyond the current situation and focus on the future.

“We’re going to have to have fiscal discipline,” he told the business people, adding that it would be impossible “to perpetually finance the levels of debt” that the federal government is accumulating.

He wants to expand health care coverage and preserve Social Security and Medicare while putting the government on a path to lower deficits.

To do all this, Obama likely will tackle health care and Medicare first by trying to rein in Medicare provider costs, a proposal doctors, hospitals and some patients will oppose.

The solution may be to take the long-term choices out of Congress’ hands.

A group of former budget officials recommended a bipartisan commission that would come up with a plan to deal with long-term fiscal issues. The commission’s plan would be presented to Congress for an up-or-down vote. This model has been used successfully to decide on military base closures.

The commission could hire Bob Whitmore.