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Friday, November 12, 2010
Ind. Gov't. - "Deficit to rule state hearings on the budget"
Niki Kelly has the report today in the Fort Wayne Journal Gazette. The story begins:
INDIANAPOLIS – State budget hearings begin next week as lawmakers prepare to attack a structural deficit while writing a new two-year spending plan.[More] See this Nov. 12, 2010 story by Lesley Stedman Weidenbener of the Louisville Courier Journal, headed "Scrutiny for Indiana's next budget begins Wednesday."The State Budget Committee, made up of four lawmakers and the state budget director, will hear budget requests from public colleges and state agencies starting Wednesday.
Meetings will take place intermittently throughout November and December.
“We go through the drill every year,” said Sen. Luke Kenley, R-Noblesville, chairman of the Budget Committee and Senate Appropriations. “I think the difference is going to be there is going to be a lot of probing on specific programs and cuts. It may be a little more intense in that regard.”
Gov. Mitch Daniels has made hundreds of millions in budget cuts to get through the current biennium, but the state still spends more than it takes in. To do so, the state has relied on federal stimulus dollars and spending down the state surplus, which once was as high as $1.3 billion under Daniels.
Reserves will be nearly drained at the end of the fiscal year in June, which means legislators have a structural deficit to deal with when crafting a new budget.
Kenley thinks that deficit is about $1 billion and legislators will have to cut that amount out of the budget they pass if they don’t want to raise taxes. The last two-year state budget was about $27 billion.
Posted by Marcia Oddi on November 12, 2010 09:59 AM
Posted to Indiana Government