[A]t the beginning of every legislative session, lawmakers review the state’s finances and make adjustments in the budget for the current fiscal year.
The budget adjustment act, H.633, is a sleeper issue, but it sets the stage for the main event: the unveiling of the Big Bill, the next year’s budget. The governor’s office and the House are moving ahead with a vote on mid-year adjustment before Gov. Phil Scott presents his fiscal year 2019 budget on Tuesday, Jan. 23.
This year’s total proposed budget changes are small — about $8 million worth of adjustments — and lawmakers in the House Appropriations Committee unanimously supported the package last Friday. The House will vote on the measure this Thursday.
But a few of the items in the budget adjustment signal debates to come over key appropriations and policy issues.
This year the House Appropriations Committee decided not to accept the Scott administration’s proposal to use a $6 million surplus to buy down anticipated expenses in the fiscal year 2019 budget. Officials from the Vermont Department of Finance and Management proposed, for example, to use the money to pay ahead on a 27th week of payroll expenses.
Lawmakers opted instead to create a reserve fund.
The chair of the committee, Rep. Kitty Toll, D-Danville, said lawmakers didn’t want to make decisions about the fiscal year 2019 budget until they had the Scott administration’s 2019 budget in hand and had a better understanding of pressures from the federal government.
“We’re not spending the money, we’re holding it until we have the full picture,” Toll said. “We thought it was the responsible thing to do. We don’t want to pay off obligations like the 27th week until we can look at whole landscape. We don’t want to look at it piecemeal.”
Lawmakers rejected a $3.1 million economic development plan from the commerce agency. At first the committee believed the money was to be used to pay down the Vermont Life magazine debt that is roughly the same amount. Later, they were told that the money was to be used to help boost the economy. Toll said lawmakers are excited about the idea generally, but she it was “hard to put money aside for something that hasn’t been formulated yet.”
Here are a few of the key changes made by House Appropriations:
- Funding for the Vermont Veterans’ Home was increased by more than $400,000 to cover ongoing deficit spending.
- A $375,000 household health insurance survey was approved.
- Children’s Integrated Service, a program that supports families with children who are disabled, developmentally delayed or have behavioral problems, did not spend $1 million of its budget this year and will be cut by that amount in the current year.
- The $44 million child care assistance budget, which subsidizes child care for low-income families, was reduced by $500,000. A number of families are making too much to qualify for the subsidy, Toll said.
- Lawmakers rejected a proposal to spend $300,000 on a study of how the equalized student count system is impacting rural schools.
