Pawlenty defends unallotment power in court filing

Gov. Tim Pawlenty filed a brief with the Minnesota Supreme Court Tuesday defending the constitutionality of his unallotment authority.

Pawlenty is asking the court to overturn a lower court ruling that said he overstepped his authority to cut state spending unilaterally.

The Republican governor made $2.7 billion in cuts on his own last spring to balance the state budget, when he couldn't reach an agreement with DFL legislative leaders.

The original lawsuit dealt specifically with cuts to a state food program for the poor.

The ruling by Ramsey County District Judge Kathleen Gearin in December called into question all of the cuts the Republican governor made after he and the Democratic-led Legislature failed to agree on a two-year budget. So the Supreme Court has put the case on the fast track, with oral arguments set for March 15.

During a news conference at the state Capitol, Pawlenty said his position is simple.

"The short version is the statute is constitutional, and the way that we used it and interpreted it was legal," he said.

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The governor's attorneys wrote in their brief Tuesday that the Pawlenty administration use of unallotment was legally valid, and that the statute doesn't violate the separation of powers between the executive and legislative branches under the Minnesota Constitution.

Gearin had ruled that Pawlenty "crossed the line between legitimate exercise of his authority to unallot and interference with the legislative power to make laws."

She wrote that unallotment is meant for an unforeseen budget crisis and "is not meant to be used as a weapon by the executive branch to break a stalemate in budget negotiations with the Legislature."

The governor's attorneys countered that it was Gearin who went too far. They wrote that the language of the unallotment statute is plain, and nothing in it requires that a budget crisis be unforeseen. They said the cuts were necessary to keep the budget balanced as mandated by the Minnesota Constitution.

The program directly at issue in the lawsuit, the Minnesota Supplemental Aid-Special Diet, helps elderly and disabled people on fixed incomes with special dietary needs stemming from health concerns. Mid-Minnesota Legal Assistance filed the suit on behalf of six recipients it says depend on the program.

Galen Robinson, an attorney for Mid-Minnesota Legal Assistance, did not immediately return a phone call seeking comment on Tuesday's filing. The legal aid group has until Feb. 23 to file its response, then Pawlenty's attorneys have until March 2 to reply to that.

Adding some urgency to the high court's ruling is the state's deteriorating financial condition. Since Pawlenty imposed the $2.7 billion in cuts, which were supposed to balance the budget, the state has slipped another $1.2 billion deeper into the red for its current two-year budget period, which ends June 30, 2011.

Thirty-three Minnesota House Republicans filed a friend-of-the-court brief supporting Pawlenty.

They wrote that the unallotment statute is a constitutional delegation of legislative power to the governor. They said this is a "wholly political dispute" that should be resolved between the executive and legislative branches.

DFL leaders plan to announce a proposal Wednesday to limit a governor's unallotment authority. Pawlenty on Tuesday repeated his promise to veto any limits on executive power made without his agreement.

"For them to do it unilaterally, and just throw it at me is not a good way to go about it," Pawlenty said.

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AP reporter Martiga Lohn contributed to this story from St. Paul, Minn.

(Copyright 2010 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)

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