NASHVILLE – Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee says he expects a controversial $4 million grant provision included in this year’s $38.55 billion budget to get back on track once more transparency and guidelines are established on how groups are awarded taxpayer dollars.
“Oh yeah, we anticipate that money being spent on rural development grants and opportunities to improve communities,” the Republican governor said Monday when asked about the disputed $4 million appropriation during a break in his first day of public budget hearings on the fiscal year 2021 spending plan he will submit to legislators next year.
Lee said he and other administration officials “just want to make sure that the lack of clarity that has been evident – or at least has been communicated by some lawmakers – that we bring total clarity to that so there’s no misunderstanding about how that money will be spent and to make sure it will be spent effectively.”
Democratic leaders have denounced the money as a “slush fund” that then-Republican House Speaker Glen Casada had engineered before his forced resignation over unrelated matters.
The origin of the $4 million grant came from the Lee administration, which last spring had proposed a $3 million amendment for the Department of Economic and Community Development.