A summary of Gov. Bill Ritter’s proposed budget cuts for the next fiscal year beginning July 1:
Work force:
— Keep vacant or eliminate more than 540 full-time jobs.
— Impose five unpaid furlough days on most of the state’s work force, for a $15 million savings, and authorize up to three furlough days this fiscal year if necessary.
— Withhold salary increases for 26,000 state employees, saving nearly $63.1 million.
Corrections:
— Close the 210-bed Colorado Women’s Correctional Facility in Canon City effective May 31, saving $5.2 million, eliminating 71 jobs and requiring the transfer and double-bunking of inmates at other facilities.
— Close the 192-bed Rifle Correctional Facility effective May 31 and sell the property and water rights, saving $5.7 million.
— Sell a department-owned 1,000-acre ranch with water rights in Chafee County, saving $2.7 million.
— Delay the April 2010 opening of Colorado State Penitentiary II in Canon City until July or August 2010, saving $16.4 million.
— Delay the opening by one year, to July 2010, the expansion of the Denver Reception Diagnostic Center, saving $2.7 million.
Human Services:
— Close the 20-bed general hospital at the Colorado Mental Health Institute at Pueblo effective Nov. 1, saving $4.8 million and eliminating 54 jobs.
— Close the 20-bed Therapeutic Child Care Facility at Fort Logan effective July 1, saving $2.1 million and eliminating 30 jobs.
— Reduce an earlier request for increased funding for developmental disability services, saving $3.4 million.
Education:
— Reduce state K-12 funding by $126 million, a 3.8 percent decline from Ritter’s initial proposal.
— Reductions also include suspending a second enrollment count for military children ($1.8 million), reducing charter school capital construction ($2.5 million), and reducing full-day kindergarten expansion ($17.9 million).
Higher Education:
— Reduce state higher education funding by $100 million (this includes the $30 million reduction from this year), decreasing the state’s contribution to higher education to last year’s funding level of about $750 million.
Health Care:
— Reduce Medicaid expenditures, provider rates and reimbursement obligations, saving about $150 million.
— Suspend outreach efforts and reduce funding for Children’s Basic Health Plan Plus, saving $19.3 million.
Other:
— Suspend the Senior Property Tax Homestead Exemption for three years, saving $91.4 million, $97.6 million, and $103.4 million, respectively.
— Eliminate the Colorado Student Before and After School Program, saving $300,000.
— Reinstate a $10 to $15 user fee for the Colorado Bureau of Investigation’s gun background check service, saving $1.6 million.
