Legislature Spends Like Drunken Sailors

The Fort Wayne Journal-Gazette's Niki Kelly takes a look at spending by the Indiana General Assembly on itself, and it's not pretty. In fact, it downright out of control. The House will spend $33.9 million during the next biennium, while the Senate will spend $26.2 million, or a combined $60.1 million in spending. That's over $400,000 per member. And that's not counting more than $2 million in planned renovations or the $20 million it will spend to run the Legislative Services Agency, which is the substantive staff charged with drafting bills and amendments and preparing fiscal impact statements.

The easiest example of wasteful legislative spending is the $353,000 in wasted legal bills for the House prayer lawsuit, some of which went into the pocket of the law firm of former House Speaker Brian Bosma. More than $5 million went to pay for constituent mailers, which are really nothing more than taxpayer-funded re-election brochures for members. Even though members are paid a healthy per diem for each day the legislature is in session, the House and Senate shelled out more than $20,000 to purchase food and drink for members while the legislature is in session. Then there's the staff. The House employs 83 full-time staffers compared to the Senate's 65. Kelly's report notes, however, that staffing for the Indiana legislature is well below the national average for other state legislatures.