Governor plans to cut agencies answering to him

Gov. Asa Hutchinson said Thursday that he plans to propose in the 2019 regular session cutting the number of agencies reporting to him from 42 to fewer than 20 in what would be the most sweeping reorganization of state government since 1972.

The Republican governor contrasted the 42 state agency directors reporting to him with the 15 Cabinet-level officials who report to the president of United States.

“This size of our state Cabinet is unwieldy and does not allow for sufficient accountability to the taxpayers,” said Hutchinson, who has served as governor since January 2015. He is a former U. S. attorney, 3rd District congressman, undersecretary of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security,and head of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration.

“Everything is on the table. I think you have to start with a white sheet of paper as you look at the government reorganization,” the Republican governor said at a news conference in the governor’s conference room at the Capitol.

“Now, everybody starts with your own opinions on this and, for example, [the Department of Human Services] I don’t believe needs to be merged with the

Department of Health,” Hutchinson said. “In my mind, that’s not something that I would be considering. Gov. [Mike] Huckabee visited that, but that’s not the direction that I would like to see it go. So beyond that small illustration, it is a white sheet of paper.”

In 2005, the Legislature approved Huckabee’s plan to merge the Department of Health into Department of Human Services. Then, the Legislature repealed that merger in 2007 at the behest of then-G0v. Mike Beebe, a Democrat who succeeded Huckabee.

Hutchinson noted that Gov. Dale Bumpers in 1972 led a successful effort to reduce the number of agencies reporting to him from 60 to 13 and “that was [a] historic transformation of state government.

“Since then, our state has reversed course, added new agencies and failed to sufficiently organize the agencies of state government in a fully accountable way that best serves our citizens,” Hutchinson said.

Huckabee led the last major effort to reorganize state government in 2003. He won the Senate’s approval for his bill to realign 53 state agencies into 10 departments, but the measure failed to clear the House of Representatives. The Democrats controlled the Senate and House back then. Republicans have controlled both chambers since 2013.

Of the current effort, Hutchinson said it started with an initiative by then-Sen. Eddie Joe Williams, R-Cabot, in which the governor was asked to consider reorganizing state government.

Hutchinson said he created the Transformation Advisory Board of business people, former and current state employees and lawmakers in February 2017.

Hutchinson said he wants the Transformation Advisory Board to “take the lead in developing the specifics of the plan that we will present to the Legislature” and report to him this fall.

“It must be driven not from the top of state government. It must be created by the stakeholders, by the citizens of this state, by our state employees, as well as our legislators,” he said.

“I recognize the challenge that this presents. This is not easy,” he said. “There will be those that are concerned about their jobs. There will be those that are concerned about their positions. There will be stakeholders that will be concerned where their particular department ranks in state government.

“We have to set that aside as well as work with them and listen to them. We have to come up with a solution that meets the objectives of service orientation, efficiency and responsiveness and accountability in state government,” Hutchinson said. He said his intention is to reorganize state government through attrition and not through layoffs.

Asked about his ideas, Rep. Matthew Shepherd, who serves on the transformation board, said, “Being around here for eight years, I think everybody that serves here has their own ideas, but nothing at this point that I’d feel comfortable putting out there publicly.

“For me, efficiency in government has always been a priority and efficiency is in part about what you are spending on government and part of it is about the services that you are providing for your citizens,” said Shepherd, an El Dorado Republican who is line to be the House speaker in 2019-21.

Hutchinson said constitutionally independent agencies such as the two- and four-year colleges, the Department of Transportation and the Game and Fish Commission won’t be the focus of his proposed reorganization because they don’t report to him.

There are 25,301 state employees in agencies that report to the governor, while there are 29,262 employees at the state’s colleges and universities and 5,911 employees at other constitutionally independent agencies, as well as the judiciary and the Legislature, said Scott Hardin, a spokesman for the Department of Finance and Administration.

The agencies under the governor’s control have total operating budgets of $19.2 billion a year, while constitutionally independent agencies have operating budgets totaling $10.2 billion and regulatory boards have operating budgets totaling $61.9 million, Hardin said.

Last month, Hutchinson announced his plan to ask the 2019 Legislature to cut the state’s top income tax rate from 6.9 percent to 6 percent, which he said is projected to

reduce state tax revenue by about $180 million a year. In 2015 and 2017, the Legislature enacted his plans to cut individual income tax rates by about $150 million a year.

Tracy Horne, a spokesman for Hutchinson’s Republican gubernatorial opponent, Jan Morgan of Hot Springs, said in a written statement that “Asa Hutchinson’s announcement today to reduce his cabinet to around 20 employees and reducing state departments by 50% is comical and amusing.

“He can’t run on his administration’s

record of increased spending, increased taxes and suffocating business regulations, so he resorts to this type of misleading and predictable campaign rhetoric to try and fool voters, but Arkansans won’t be fooled this time!!” Horne said.

“No amount of money and political posturing will convince Arkansans that Asa is a Conservative and not a tax and spend Liberal,” he said in his written statement.

Lt. Gov. Tim Griffin, a Republican from Little Rock who serves on the Transformation Advisory Board, said in a written statement that “state government taxes too much and spends too much, and as Lieutenant Governor and Vice Chair of the Transformation Advisory Board, I am working to change that.

“I applaud the Governor’s call to reorganize and reduce state agencies. Transforming government is never easy, but it’s the right thing to do. We owe it to hardworking Arkansas taxpayers to be good stewards of their money by doing more with less,” he said.