While talk of a 'crisis' is premature, budget deliberations in Olympia will severely test lawmakers. Moreover, for the first time since 1993, desired spending exceeds available revenues. Expenditure reductions will be required and legislators will be tempted to amend or scrap the spending limit. Nonetheless, budget writers will be severely tested next year.
Several factors come together to complicate the crafting of the biennial general fund state budget.
First, the passage of Initiative 728 and Initiative 732 significantly limited legislative discretion. First let s look at the balance sheet. Maintenance level budget. But the budget begins to tighten immediately when the continuing costs of current programs and services are included. That s the budget that incorporates the costs of extending current services including growth in entitlement caseloads and school enrollments forward into the next biennium.