John --
Good morning, and welcome to yet another JUNE edition of our state capitol update!
Today is June 20th, and we are unfortunately still not close to a state budget. The deadline to pass one is NEXT WEEK. I participated in some initial conversations on a potential bipartisan state budget last week, but we still have a way to go before we can come to a deal.
What’s at stake, you ask? Well, the state budget is about $14 billion per year, and that includes things like K-12 education, our state universities, our state Medicaid system, corrections, roads, state agencies, and so much more. We also have a projected surplus of over $5 billion (about $1.5 billion ongoing, about $3.7 billion one-time) that the governor and the legislature want to utilize this year before the session is over.
The initial Republican budget proposal that dropped two weeks ago (and which I covered in last week’s update) included a lot of new spending, and it included items that both Democrats and Republicans did not like. For some Republican members, they are opposed because they think we are spending TOO much money, and for Democratic members, they don’t like where some of the money is going (items like border security and pork projects for Republican districts) and feel that not enough investment is going to other areas (like K-12 education and housing, for starters).
The other factor here is the governor, who is in his last year and wants to spend quite a bit of money before he leaves office. He wants pay raises for state employees (which I support) and wants to dedicate $1 billion over the next three years for water infrastructure (which I support as well). Why is this important? He has members of his own party who don’t want to spend more money and want to cut taxes instead.
This is one of the reasons why I’ve been saying for months that a bipartisan budget deal is the only solution: the governor wants to spend more money than many members of his own party, and they know they can balk and hold up session unless the majority gets Democrats on board. Democrats by and large are fine with the spending items the governor wants, and in exchange would like to see some of their own priorities funded too.
Are you thinking what I’m thinking? A compromise seems logical here, right? That’s what negotiation is for! What a concept!
Of course, a negotiation requires two parties who are equally invested in wanting to make a deal. For months, I have been building a bipartisan coalition of members to help get this deal done. Now all we need is the governor’s office and majority leadership to meet us halfway.
Another factor that helps speed a deal along and get parties to the negotiating table? A deadline. As in, our deadline to pass a state budget by next week. Next week!
What are the additional priorities I am pushing for in the state budget this year? Here are the key items:
-$550 million ongoing for K-12 education to go in the base funding formula;
-$100 million ongoing for an opportunity weight that helps fund lower-income districts;
-$100 million ongoing for Career and Technical Education (CTE) grants for school districts;
-$50 million ongoing for the Promise Program Scholarship for financial aid for college students at our three state universities;
-Additional ongoing support for our three state universities through their New Economy Initiative (NEI);
-$30 million ongoing for our state Housing Trust Fund to help fund construction projects for more affordable housing throughout the state;
-$75 million ongoing for my state Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) program, a dedicated tax cut for low-income working families
We have the resources to do this, and all the items above have bipartisan support. I’m ready to get to work!
Looking ahead to this week, I still do not expect us to pass a budget by the end of the week. I do expect negotiations to pick up, and certainly want to do my part to help get a deal done. Given all the parameters at play, I still think a bipartisan budget is the only logical and realistic path to getting a deal done before next week.
If you exclude the bipartisan skinny budget we passed two years ago due to COVID, 2006 was the last time we had a true bipartisan budget at the state level. Can we pass the first one in over 15 years? I think we can!
I’m at the office early this morning and will be the rest of the week. Stay tuned to more regular updates on my Facebook and Twitter feeds as we continue throughout the week.
Thank you as always for reading!
Sean
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