Oregon Public Broadcasting

A special session of the Washington legislature appears more and more unlikely. That means Governor Chris Gregoire would have to resort to across-the-board cuts to rebalance the state budget, as Oregon has done. Austin Jenkins says that hasn't happened in Washington in nearly twenty years.

Booth Gardiner in 1991.

That's the last time a Washington governor was forced to unilaterally slash spending to avoid running a deficit.

Now, 19 years later, Gregoire faces the same financial predicament.

In this case, Congress has failed to deliver on several hundred million in Medicaid dollars. Money majority Democrats banked on.

That leaves the freshly balanced state budget upside down to the tune of more than $300M.

Gregoire says the Democratic lawmakers she's hearing from don't think a short special session is doable.

Chris Gregoire: "They don't think they can achieve consensus on where the cuts should be made. And if that's where they are then I don't want to have them come back and spend thirty days and have us not get going."

In recent days, minority Republicans have called for a special session to make cuts that are specific rather than across-the-board.

The governor says she'll announce her decision next week.