Lawmakers seek reworked budget

MONTPELIER — Leaders of the House and Senate are delicately rejecting the governor’s budget proposal as they hunker down on crafting a spending plan of their own that is likely to include budget cuts and, perhaps, some new revenue.

Gov. Phil Scott released his budget proposal last month, which addressed the state’s projected $70 million budget hole in the 2018 fiscal year by moving some general fund obligations to the education fund. The proposal relies on local school districts level-funding their 2018 fiscal year budgets to avoid a massive increase in property taxes.

But lawmakers have already rejected one key portion of Scott’s proposal — moving school budget votes from Town Meeting Day to May 23. The Senate Education Committee and the full House held votes rejecting the change in the voting date. That means school districts will not have the necessary time to redo their budgets.

“The Senate took a straw poll,” House Speaker Mitzi Johnson, D-South Hero, said in an interview. “The House took a really strong vote to say, ‘Look, we can’t just push back the timeline on school budgets that are already ready to go. That ship has sailed. To ask school boards to, after they’ve spent the last four months dealing with budgets, to spend the next four months dealing with budgets and bargaining, was not reasonable.”

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