State Revenue Secretary Eric Nelson described a moving target and balancing act as state officials begin to devise next fiscal year’s budget. Nelson was speaking before the Legislature’s Joint Committee on Finance during September interim meetings on Monday morning at the Capitol.
Nelson highlighted a number of variables that are likely to create a challenging budgeting process, including the increased costs associated with PEIA and as much as a $200 million cost increase for the HOPE Scholarship program next year.
He told lawmakers the fiscal year 2027 budgeting process is already underway.
“All of the agencies have submitted their initial budgets to the Budget Office as of Sept. 1,” Nelson said. “As is normal, our process begins here in September. The budget teams puts this together, then we will roll into having budget presentations in person by the agencies in October. That product will be put together in November and December and be presented to you all in early January.”
Director of the State Budget Office, Mike Mckown, had positive news, telling lawmakers that the state has around $2 billion in its various reserve accounts. He noted that the state’s various Rainy Day Funds grew by about 7.3 percent over the last fiscal year.
The Income Tax Reserve Fund, which was established to safeguard against the lost revenues from reductions to the personal income tax, has a balance of more than $460 million, according to Mckown.
