The Rhode Island House of Representatives voted to approve a $8.2 billion FY 2014 budget Wednesday. Photo by Kim Kalunian, WPRO News.
By Kim Kalunian, WPRO News
After two days of debate, the Rhode Island House of Representatives passed the $8.2 billion state budget for fiscal year 2014 in a 52-20 vote.
Less than an hour after the House vote, the Senate Finance Committee approved the budget in a brief meeting, sending it to the Senate floor Thusday.
The major points of multi-day House debate centered on historic tax credits, delaying the Sakonnet River Bridge tolls, putting $12.9 million into the state’s pension fund, and the repayment of the loans associated with 38 Studios.
After hours of debate and the introduction of several amendments to either scratch repayment of 38 Studios entirely, or else divert the money to another place, the House voted in favor of the Article that contained the repayment. The budget also included $50,000 for an analysis of the potential impacts of defaulting on the loan. Additionally, the House voted to kill the Job Creation Guaranty program which allowed the EDC to grant Curt Schilling's defunct gaming company the $75 million loan.
Perhaps the most surprising moment of the debate occurred on Tuesday night, when the House voted down Article 5 of the budget. The article would have, as amended, skipped a $12.9 million bonus payment into the state’s pension fund for FY 2014.
The House voted it down 69 to 63, leaving leadership scratching their heads as how to fill the nearly $13 million hole. At about 1:30 a.m. Wednesday morning, the House did something they hadn’t done since 1992: recessed until the next day.
The House reconvened shortly after 2 p.m. Wednesday afternoon, but delayed the budget conversation while lawmakers scrambled behind the scenes to crunch numbers and come up with a viable solution to the budget imbalance.
Once a solution was ready, the House voted to amend the budget by scratching $6 million in personnel expenses across the state, pulling $3 million in funding for a bridge and roads project, taking $3 million from one-time sources like grants, and nixing another $800,000 from the Attorney General’s mortgage settlement, thereby balancing the budget again.
The House also voted to add an article that would defer the implementation of Sakonnet River Bridge tolls until early 2014, and passed an article that restores the historic tax credit program.
