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Texas' Budget Process Moves Further Away From Reality

  

Author:
Eva DeLuna Castro /(512) 320-0222 x 103

June 25, 2012

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On June 4, the Governor’s Budget Office and the Legislative Budget Board issued budget instructions to state government agencies, state courts, and public higher education institutions. For most state services, these instructions define the General Revenue (GR) baseline for the coming 2014-15 biennium at the reduced funding levels established by the 2011 session’s budget cuts. Because these instructions do not allow the baseline to grow enough to cover population growth or cost inflation – what “current services” proposals would require – they keep Texas on the wrong path by concealing the true consequences of an ever-growing population. Agencies and universities must also describe how they would cut GR spending by another 10 percent. The Legislature will use the baseline proposals to write the draft budget bill it will consider in 2013.