State could cut higher education funding in 2019

With low starting budget projections and large bills for Hurricane Harvey aid and Medicaid, higher education funding may be in danger of being cut when the state Legislature reconvenes next year.

State Comptroller Glenn Hegar, who collects the state’s taxes and monitors its revenue, said in a January Senate Finance Committee hearing that the state will only have a $94 million “beginning balance” compared to $880 million in 2017 and $7.3 billion in 2015. The finance committee helps write the state’s biennial budget each session.

To make up for budget constraints, the first thing the Legislature does is turn to the comptroller to find more money, education and law professor Norma Cantu said.

“The next reaction for the Legislature would be to look at reallocating resources, which means that one part of the state budget would be starved in order to support another part,” Cantu said. “That becomes a very divisive exercise, and the last recourse would be to look at raising taxes.”

Read more: http://www.dailytexanonline.com/2018/03/28/state-could-cut-higher-education-funding-in-2019