Garcia: Sen. Menéndez says Texas needs a holistic approach to budget surplus
State Senator Jose Menéndez speaks during an immigration town hall meeting Monday evening at UTSA's Buena Vista Theater.As state lawmakers prepare for the 2023 legislative session, the state is looking at an unprecedented budget surplus.
We saw it a few months ago in San Antonio, with council members and local activists arguing over what to do with $75 million in surplus CPS Energy revenue: Should the city give it back to ratepayers or use it for climate mitigation?Texas has more uninsured residents and more people behind bars than any other state. We’re grappling with a teacher shortage and mediocre educational performance. The state also has done a consistently poor job of addressing mental-health and foster-care issues.
“I’ve been there when we’ve had money, when we’ve been broke and in-between. The reality is that obviously this money is not our money. It’s not the state’s money. It’s the citizens’ ,” Menéndez said during an interview on the Express-News’ Puro Politics podcast. Menéndez said he has always regarded his top priority as an elected official to be a good steward of taxpayer money. Defining that term is where the nuance comes in.
Menéndez said state lawmakers should approach the surplus issue the same way they would think about their own family’s budget. But he also thinks about the budget in the holistic terms of the late American psychologist Abraham Maslow’s hierarchy of innate human needs, which posits that self-actualization can only be achieved if our fundamental needs are met.
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