National Media; Internet Bloggers Are Wrong

Reports by mainstream media in the United States that Alaska Governor Sarah Palin slashed funding in half for Special Olympics Alaska are inaccurate at best.

National Public Radio and the New York Times both have reports containing claims that Palin cut Special Olympics Alaska. Internet bloggers on sites such as Media Nation, Think Progress and The Liberal OC all have entries and links to claims that Palin cut Special Olympics funding in half.

Yet, a closer examination of state budget records reveals that Palin’s administration increased its funding of Special Olympics Alaska in this budget year as opposed to the previous year.

Under Palin’s administration, Special Olympics Alaska is actually set to receive $25,000 more in fiscal year 08-09 than it did in fiscal year 07-08, according to state budget records. In the 07-08 budget approved by the Legislature, Special Olympics Alaska received $250,000 in capital monies for improving the organization’s facilities and securing equipment. In the the 08-09 budget approved by the Legislature last summer, Special Olympics Alaska is slated to receive $275,000 in capital monies.

Yet, those same state records will show that Special Olympics Alaska received just about half of what the agency requested during the 08-09 budgeting process.

And that is where the national media and the Democratic party mistakenly jumped on the budget slashing bandwagon.

A request during the budgeting process - long before any appropriations are approved - is simply that. It is a request. It isn’t secured funding.

Ask For More; Take What You Get

In the 08-09 budgeting process that took place last spring long before Palin was the Republican nominee for vice president, Special Olympics Alaska requested $550,000.

It was one of many bloated budget requests made by non-profits in the state hoping to reach deep into state coffers filled with oil revenue money the state received in the form of royalties from energy companies working on the North Slope.

Can you blame non-profits in the state for going for the extra? It’s the time-tested policy of asking for more than you need in hopes that you will actually get what you need.

Special Olympics Alaska wasn’t alone in going for a bigger chunk.

There are good reasons why Special Olympics Alaska asked for the increase.

The state organization is only a couple years into having its own building in Anchorage’s Mountain View district. This building houses office space for the staff of the state organization, a meeting room for teams and coaches and a small, state-of-the-art, work-out room used primarily by adult athletes.

The organization leadership was looking to increase its land holdings to possibly build a gymnasium. Currently, the organization relies on rentals and even outright donations for athlete training for certain sports requiring a gymnasium or larger space than currently owned.

How Do I Know All of This?

My son, Ian, age 11, is a Special Olympics athlete.

He participates in year-round sports and thus, his father and I end up at a lot of practices where folks talk a lot off the record about a lot of things. That, of course, isn’t too out of the ordinary in any kid’s sports practice. But last spring there was a great deal of “coffee shop style” talk about an effort to purchase additional property. Maybe with the extra oil revenue, the state would help out.

The rumor mill spin had validation in the $550,000 request presented to the state. Readers can check it out for themselves in the budgetary documents that will show.

The same “valid use story” was true for many other non-profit requests being made in the 08-09 state budgeting process. Many of these - including the full $550,000 for Special Olympics Alaska - were given the nod by the Legislature. However, even that does not make them approved and funded budget items. That just doesn’t happen in Alaska until the governor signs off on it just as it doesn’t happen in Washington, D.C. until the president signs off.

And in the end, Alaska Governor Sarah Palin said no to many of the inflated requests made during last spring’s budgeting process.

Yet, Special Olympics Alaska still received a $25,000 increase from the previous year.

$25,000 Is Still An Increase

The reason many in the national media point to this as a slash is because not giving Special Olympis Alaska the full amount it asked for is a break from tradition. In 08-09, the $275,000 equated to about half of what was requested. In the previous budget year, Special Olympics Alaska requested $250,000 and in the end received $250,000.

What looks like a cut during the budgeting process really ended up being more capital money for Special Olympics Alaska.

The folks at Special Olympics Alaska are pleased by that.

“If you look at the public record, Sarah Palin has been more than supportive to Special Olympics Alaska,” said Jim Balamaci, president and CEO.

Special Olympics Alaska leadership has also made it quite clear in on the record and off the record conversation regarding the alleged cut that the funding request was for capital monies only and did not impact the day-to-day operation budget at all.

In other words, the alleged slash isn’t hurting athletes.

I can tell you that I haven’t seen any changes in my son’s practices.

Correct Way To Read A Budget

So, just how did such a glaring error end up being repeated by several national outlets?

For some answers, I turned to Brooks Jackson, director of FactCheck.org. It is a political fact-checking website put out by the Annenberg Public Policy Center affiliated with the University of Pennsylvania - a long way from Palin’s Last Frontier.

Jackson is a former political reporter with more 34 years experience covering Washington, D.C., and the national political scene for the Associated Press, the Wall Street Journal and CNN. The later is where he began “adwatch” and “factcheck” forms of reporting during the 1992 presidential campaign. These days, Jackson is directing a team of fact-checkers with the sole goal he said, “of trying to provide ordinary citizens/voters with a place to go to sort through all of the conflicting claims” being made by politicians and Internet bloggers.

He couldn’t understand either why some in the national media thought Palin slashed Special Olympics Alaska funding.

While his group hasn’t taken a real in-depth look at the claim regarding Special Olympics Alaska and its allegedly slashed funding, FactCheck. org has scrutunized other claims made by national media and Internet bloggers regarding Palin and her state administration. The group has concluded the bulk of those claims - including ones that she cut special education funding by 62 percent - to be false, according to information posted on the group’s website.

While he labeled the mistake over the Special Olympics Alaska funding to be one that any novice statehouse reporter wouldn’t make, Brooks wasn’t surprised to hear that various media were trying to paint Palin with a dark brush. He isn’t surprised to learn that some may be missing the mark on Special Olympics Alaska funding by equating a slashed request to be the same as slashed funding.

But he said that isn’t the correct way - in budgetary terms - to view the fact that Special Olympics Alaska received $275,000 instead of $550,000 in sthe state 08-09 fiscal year.

“The right way to look at budget matters is this: Was funding actually increased or decreased from one year to the next?” Jackson said. “You cannot say that just because someone asked for the moon and got only a little bit of it that funding was slashed.”

Some Internet bloggers are now posting advisory warnings that portions of the information regarding an alleged slash to the Special Olympics Alaska budget may be inaccurate.

One site, Think Progress, lists an update that the actual funding did increase by $25,000, but then also underlines a statement and link to documents showing that to be only half of what was requested.

As the parent of a Special Olympics athlete in the state of Alaska, I personally would certainly liked to have seen the full request of $550,000 be funded. Special Olympics Alaska can use more permanent facilities to continue its mission. However, as a citizen and taxpayer in the state of Alaska, I am also realistic enough to recognize that we simply do not get everything that we ask for. And while I am no budgetary expert, I do know enough to confidently state that when the nit hits the grit, $275,000 is still $25,000 more than $250,000 and it most certainly isn’t a cut to any pre-existing funding.