Gov. Bill Ritter’s latest budget re-balancing plan, not unlike some of his previous actions, relies heavily on one-time money shuffles and federal stimulus funds.
The plan, announced Friday, would bridge what Ritter’s office estimates as a $262 million general-fund shortfall for the current 2010-11 budget year, which runs through June.
The plan would:
• Keep current funding levels for K-12 schools intact by having districts use $156.3 million in federal funds recently approved by Congress for education jobs. The money ostensibly would have been used to restore prior cuts but now will instead be used to stave off even further cuts.
• Keep current funding levels for higher education intact by transferring $63.2 million in general-fund money to higher education to help offset an equal amount in federal stimulus money that would have gone to colleges and universities but instead will be used to prevent any further cuts in schools.
• Tap $55 million from a severance-tax fund that provides grants for infrastructure improvements to local communities affected by oil and gas drilling activity. About $16 million in grants still will be awarded this year for projects.
• Transfer $10 million from a severance-tax fund that helps provide loans for water projects. There will be a balance of about $21 million left after the transfer.
• Save $55.1 million by extending a two-week delay of payments to Medicaid providers to three weeks.
• Cut $15.2 million by delaying payments to managed-care Medicaid providers.
• Transfer $2.5 million from a tourism fund that is funded by casino revenues. The transfer will not affect the current year’s tourism budget of $14.4 million.
The recommendations must be approved by the legislature when it convenes next year.
Colorado’s total general fund is now less than $6.9 billion, and revenue forecasts show the state could be facing up to a $1.1 billion shortfall in the 2011-12 year, which begins in July of next year.
Ritter, a Democrat, said Republicans right now are hammering Democratic lawmakers seeking re-election over their support for measures that scaled back or eliminated more than $100 million in tax credits and exemptions to help balance the budget. Democrats also supported legislation eliminating a $100 million property-tax break for seniors over two years.
“We hear a lot of rhetoric, especially these days,” Ritter said. “It’s easy to spin, hard to govern responsibly. But without actions on credits and exemptions and the homestead (senior property tax) exemption, K-12 and higher education would be taking cuts of as much as $200 million more.
“Any suggestion otherwise — any claim that there’s an easy, pain-free way to balance the budget — is not just wrong but disingenuous.”
Republicans have argued there has not been enough true cutting of programs by Ritter, though he did push a $260 million cut to public schools in the current year, which the legislature approved.
Assistant Senate Minority Leader Greg Brophy, R-Wray, said Ritter’s latest plan was “nothing more than taking money from hospitals, doctors and local governments in order to avoid making the tough choices Colorado families are demanding.”
And some GOP lawmakers have criticized the state’s reliance on federal stimulus funds to balance the budget.
Since 2009, the state has used $1.6 billion in funds from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act to help balance its general-fund budget. That sum doesn’t count stimulus money the state received for infrastructure projects such as highways or other dedicated pots of money that are outside of general-fund spending.
Todd Saliman, the governor’s budget director, said Friday that if the state had not taken federal stimulus money, school districts would have had to lay off 5,000 teachers in the current year, more would have been cut from higher education, and more state prisons and motor-vehicle offices would have been closed.
