n an era of fat state budget surpluses, there is yet another undeniable truth that must be faced by opponents of Governor Paul Cellucci's income tax cut question on the November ballot: State government has grown enormously in the past decade.
We refer not only to the Commonwealth's budget, which has basically doubled since 1990 to $21.6 billion, and the debt, up 88 percent since then to $12.4 billion (one of the heaviest burdens in the country), but also to the explosive growth in the authorities.
In 10 years, the outstanding debt of the five largest quasi-independent authorities has skyrocketed from $2.83 billion to $12.12 billion - a staggering 328 percent spike. During this period of intensive infrastructure improvement, their annual revenues have increased only 72 percent, our survey shows.
While surpluses and rapid government growth may provide the best arguments to cut taxes, the debt issue may be the strongest, if least sexy, argument to stand pat or go slower.
Human-service providers and others may decry the potential impact on those in need to make the point, but Treasurer Shannon O'Brien, in a Sept. 14 speech in Lynn, said her concern about the state's ''high debt load'' is the reason she opposes Cellucci's rollback plan, a three-year phased-in cut in the income tax rate, from 5.85 percent to 5 percent, which would cost $1 billion a year. O'Brien favors a more moderate cut.
Existing debt is only part of the problem, however. There's a swollen backlog of projects needing long-term capital financing. The Legislature, over many years, has authorized an additional $11.3 billion worth of borrowing for projects that have not yet been funded and may never be because the state operates under a self-imposed $1 billion yearly cap on new borrowing.
The authorities are exempt from this cap. These are the special agencies created to do the politically unpopular dirty work for the body politic. Technically independent of state government, they operate the toll roads and tunnels, public transit system, airports and port, two convention centers and soon a third, clean up filthy Boston Harbor, and update antiquated water-delivery and sewage-treatment systems.
On top of taxes, we pay for them through user fees, which are rising steadily - water and sewer bills, bus and subway fares, bridge, turnpike and tunnel tolls, and landing fees, which, in turn, affect airline ticket prices. A new $750-million convention center in South Boston will be financed by tax and fee increases aimed at tourists and conventioneers.
Moreover, most of these authorities receive at least some annual revenue stream from taxpayers. One is heavily subsidized.
Our look at the Big Five authorities - the Turnpike, Port, Convention Center, Massachusetts Bay Transportation, and Water Resources authorities - shows that their payrolls have grown modestly in a decade but their indebtedness for infrastructure projects has mushroomed.
The outstanding debt of the MWRA, unquestionably the best-managed of the five, has soared from less than $1 billion in 1990 to $4.5 billion today, propelled by the cost of massive construction, with minimal federal aid, of new sewage and water treatment facilities. The state provides the MWRA with an annual ''rate relief'' subsidy, now about $50 million.
The MBTA, which receives an annual state subsidy of about $645 million, has extended commuter rail service to three branches south, north to Newburyport, and west to Worcester, contributing to a tripling of its debt, now $3.6 billion.
The debt of the Turnpike Authority, which since 1996 has assumed management and construction of the $14 billion Central Artery/Ted Williams Tunnel project, has soared tenfold, to $2.5 billion. The Pike is paying about $2 billion of the Big Dig costs, but the state pays the 40-year, $25-million annual debt service on $400 million of that amount.
Massport, which now operates Worcester Regional Airport and is modernizing Logan Airport at a cost of more than $1 billion, has seen its debt more than triple to $1.4 billion. The port authority is paying more than $300 million of the Big Dig tab, and is the only one of the Big Five authorities without a state subsidy.
The convention center authority, which now operates the Springfield Civic Center as well as the Hynes in Boston and will soon build a giant new South Boston convention center, receives state subsidies of $16 million for its operating deficit, plus almost $25 million for debt service. Long-term financing for the new facility will be paid with special-obligation revenue bonds. That's a fancy way of paying for more new debt.
