PDF: HB 307: Senate’s version of hospital provider fees PDF: HB 1055: House-passed fee increases bill BY THE NUMBERS* $17.7 billion: Budget for fiscal 2011* $17.4 billion: Budget for fiscal 2010* 6: Legislative days left to pass both budgets
By Ashley Speagle
Correspondent
ATLANTA – The House Appropriations Committee meets today to finalize a budget for fiscal 2011 amid disagreements between legislative chambers on how to fund it.
They have six legislative days to figure it out.
Subcommittees announced their recommendations Monday for the budget, which Gov. Sonny Perdue reduced by more than $400 million last month in response to the state’s low revenues.
To balance the $17.7 billion budget, lawmakers proposed spreading cuts throughout programs and departments.
Many departments in economic development may receive 3 percent cuts, and departments in higher education could see 3.4 percent cuts.
“This is a lot better than a lot of the doom-and-gloom scenarios we’ve heard,” said Rep. Earl Ehrhart, R-Powder Springs, chairman of the Appropriations Higher Education Subcommittee. “It’s about a 13 percent overall cut (to higher education) when it’s all said and done.”
Democrats expressed opposition to many cuts to K-12 education, including reduced funding to school lunches, buses, testing and other services, which will now depend on local funds.
Rep. Kathy Ashe, D-Atlanta, pointed out that federal stimulus funds for education are gone after being moved to fiscal 2010 to keep the amended budget stable.
On the floor of the House, she called for a statewide effort to improve Georgia’s application in the next round for federal Race to the Top funds, which she noted that Tennessee did to win its $500 million share in Race to the Top’s first round.
“Georgia lost out on part of $4 billion because we failed to make this a statewide project,” Rep. Ashe said.
The state also faces missing other sources of funding as a result of disagreements between the House and Senate.
The governor’s 2011 lowered budget number relies on $96 million in fee increases and funding Medicaid through either a 1.45 percent hospital provider fee or 10.25 percent cuts to Medicaid providers.
The bill providing for fee increases, House Bill 1055, still needs a Senate vote to take effect in the budget, and the hospital provider fee bill, HB 307, passed in different versions by both chambers.
Representatives and senators now need to agree on one version for the hospital provider fee, but some lawmakers say they still oppose the fee entirely.
Sen. Preston Smith, R-Rome, said Monday on the floor that he opposed the bill because it essentially raises taxes.
The House and Senate also must agree on an amended budget for fiscal 2010, a period with only three months left, as the House announced their disagreement to the Senate’s version Monday.
The legislature has six legislative days left to iron out their differences and has yet to set a final day for the session. But by adding days off between the days they’re actually in session, they can prolong the time they say they need to work out the budget.
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