The Governor got most of what he asked for
The fiscal 2012 budget Gov. Peter Shumlin proposed in January made its way through the Legislature largely unscathed. The majority Democratic House and Senate increased the governor’s budget by just 0.1 percent—or $5.6 million on total spending of $4.8 billion.
That’s not surprising. Legislatures rarely make big changes to what a governor proposes. The fights that generate the most heat often are over relatively small amounts of money.
But you can see for yourself. Four versions of the fiscal 2012 budget are now available for a side-by-side comparison on Vermont Transparency: the governor’s proposal, the House-passed plan, the Senate plan, and the final compromise between the House and Senate that was passed and sent to the governor on May 6, the last day of the 2011 session.
Visitors to the site can see how much was appropriated by line item for each of the major functions of state government: general government, protection, human services, labor, education, natural resources, commerce and community development, debt service, and transportation. They can view the appropriations from all sources of funding, including federal funds. And they can look at appropriations by individual funding sources, such as the General Fund.
The side-by-side comparisons are available on the Current Session page. For those who want to see how this year’s appropriations compare with prior years, budget data going back to 1994 are available on the State Spending page.
The side-by-side comparisons are great.
A few comments:
1. The data does not appear to include tax expenditures. While they are not part of the appropriated budget, they cost a lot of money. Will you consider including them in the future?
2. The year-over-year figures are not adjusted for inflation. Can you present them both ways? (both expenditures & revenues)
3. The vendor data is not available because you are awaiting changes related to confidential information. I’ve used the vendor data from Finance & Management and don’t recall any confidential information. What are you / they referring to?
4. The personal income tax page has a link to 2008 data. The Dept. has released 2009 data.
5. The appropriations data includes a category for Commerce & Community Development. For those who want more detail, would you consider a link to the Unified Economic Development Budget (UEDB) produced by Finance & Mgmt.?
Keep up the good work!