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Fiscal Year 2009 House Ways and Means Budget Preliminary Analysis
As the state faces increasingly difficult fiscal challenges, the FY 2009 Budget recommended by the House Committee on Ways and Means (HWM) is an austerity budget. It holds spending at or below the cost of providing current services in almost all areas and imposes significant cuts as well. The budget does keep two major commitments that have been made by the Legislature: it fully funds the scheduled increase in Chapter 70 local aid for education, and it appears to provide adequate funding to maintain the Commonwealth's commitment to expand access to healthcare. While the HWM budget proposes some higher funding levels than the Governor, such as in higher education, this budget does not introduce major new initiatives. The HWM budget does recommend funding for some of the Governor?s new proposals, but it generally funds them at significantly lower levels than the Governor requested.
