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The Senate on Thursday approved a nearly $50 billion state budget, after adopting more than 500 amendments over three days.
Senate President Karen Spilka said prior to the unanimous vote that she hopes House and Senate negotiators can “quickly” resolve the differences between their fiscal 2023 spending plans.
House and Senate Democrats over the years have often been unable to agree on a consensus budget by the July 1 start of the fiscal year. Failing to reach a timely agreement this year, in particular, could be consequential since legislative leaders are trying to find common ground on other major bills and formal sessions for the year, under legislative rules, end on Sunday, July 31.
During Thursday’s session, Senate Minority Leader Bruce Tarr noted the budget bill, passed as state tax collections continue to crest, managed to jack up spending by more than $2 billion but still enlarges the state’s significant rainy day savings account. Still, Tarr said, the bill fails to meet the state’s statutory responsibility to fully fund regional school transportation.
Senate budget chief Michael Rodrigues ticked off areas where the Senate bill made investments, including early, K-12 and higher education, health care, workforce accounts, housing aid. Spilka said the bill fully funds the state’s obligation under the Student Opportunity Act, a landmark education bill that seeks to plug gaps in local education budgets over a seven-year stretch.
A Senate Ways and Means spokesman said senators added more than $93 million to the budget through amendments, raising the bill’s bottom line to $49.78 billion, which is in the same ballpark as the bill that cleared the House in April.
Rodrigues, of Westport, and House Ways and Means Chair Aaron Michlewitz of Boston will lead budget negotiations in the conference. The two branches will name six conferees, and the conference panel will almost certainly vote to conduct its work entirely in private.
House conferees will be presented with a pair of major Senate policy measures. Through amendments, the Senate agreed on Thursday to a ban on non-disclosure agreements across state government. On Wednesday, the Senate agreed to licensing protections for doctors and other professionals involved with the provision of reproductive care – which covers not just abortion but also contraception, miscarriage management and other pregnancy-related services – or many supportive treatments for gender dysphoria,
