Budget

budget and local aid updates, community preservation act, financial outlook, local aid policy, priorities/requests, resources, revenue, taxes

Senate Passes FY 2014 Supplemental Budget

The Senate on Thursday voted 37-0 to pass a $200.8 million supplemental budget to cover time sensitive deficiencies and unexpected cost increases in FY 2014. This supplemental budget includes funds to address critical needs in the state’s emergency shelter programs, as well as provide additional funds for snow and ice removal.

“This supplemental budget is an important bill-paying exercise which addresses several spending deficiencies and time sensitive policy issues,” said Senator Stephen M. Brewer (D-Barre), Chairman of the Senate Committee on Ways and Means. “I am very pleased that the Senate has passed a bill that makes necessary, mid-year investments while maintaining our disciplined fiscal approach that has served us so well in recent years.”

FY15 Budget Priorities Letter to Senate Ways and Means

Today, Senator Brownsberger submitted the following letter to the Chair of the Senate Committee on Ways and Means outlining his budget priorities for Fiscal Year 2015. You will find a link to the signed document below. Read the Senator’s signed letter expressing his budget priorities here. Anne Johnson Landry Committee Counsel and Policy Advisor Office …

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Budget cuts?

Yesterday I got an email from another parent, saying that most if not all Boston public schools are facing substantial budget cuts next year. For example, Winship Elementary (where my son goes) shows a WSF allocation of $2,867,109 for FY14 (http://www.bostonpublicschools.org/cms/lib07/MA01906464/Centricity/Domain/108/Budget%20Resources/7._fy14_wsf_budgets_by_school_20130202.pdf page 115) and a projected WSF allocation of $2,349,227 for FY15 (http://www.bostonpublicschools.org/cms/lib07/MA01906464/Centricity/Domain/184/FY15%20budget%20resources/FY15%20Allocations_2015.02.05.pdf page 3) …

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Overview of the Governor’s Budget

Quite appropriately, Governor Patrick’s Fiscal 2015 budget continues and extends the priorities he has defined together with the legislature over the past 8 years.  It does not propose major new initiatives. Total proposed Fiscal 2015 budgetary spending is $36.4 billion — up $1.7 billion or 4.9% over projected Fiscal 2014 budgetary spending.  This growth is …

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Understanding the Governor’s Budget Presentation

The Patrick Administration deserves great credit for its efforts to make its budget as transparent as possible.  Nonetheless, a 46 billion dollar spending program is intrinsically complex, so here are answers to a few questions that I found myself asking as I worked through the presentation. How big is the budget? The financial statement section shows proposed …

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Are we on the right track financially?

Wall Street has applauded our state-level efforts to manage long-term liabilities — the rating agencies are giving the Commonwealth its highest ever bond ratings.  But we should consider carefully whether we should accept Wall Street’s metrics for financial health — not that I doubt the need for financial discipline, but rather that we should, perhaps, …

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