Politics & Government
Connecticut Budget Deficit Grows ... and is Expected to Keep Growing
Talks between Democratic lawmakers and Gov. Malloy have not led to any agreements on spending cuts as a deadline draws near.
HARTFORD, CT - There seems to be no end in sight to the state’s budget crisis, with current projections showing the deficit this year has nearly doubled and disagreements persisting among Democratic leaders on future spending cuts, leaving some to question whether lawmakers will ever be able to balance the budget.
It was a double whammy of bad news delivered late Friday, which is when government officials usually disseminate bad news.
It was revealed that the current budget, which expires June 30, sprung another massive leak and the deficit has doubled since projections from a few weeks ago.
The current fiscal year deficit is now at $256 million and is largely blamed on falling revenue projections including declining state income tax collections, according to the Hartford Courant.
And that’s just the beginning of the bad news. The state’s projected deficit for fiscal 2016-17, which begins July 1, has increased from $920 million to $960 million and a case could be made that it’s actually at $1 billion even.
In next year’s budget, state officials have budgeted $40 million it hopes the Office of the State Attorney General will generate through legal settlements, media reports state.
Senate Minority Leader Len Fasano, R-North Haven, told Connecticut News Junkie that Democrats are leading the state “down a very dangerous path,” by banking on money the “state simply doesn’t have” yet to help balance the budget.
Time is running out on the state to balance this year’s budget so it’s expected that the state will use a portion of its rainy day fund, which is currently at $406 million, to cover the shortfall, CT News Junkie reports.
And budget talks aimed at reducing the $960 million budget deficit for next year have not exactly been going well. Late Friday, Gov. Dannel P. Malloy told reporters that Democratic leaders have not been on board with spending cuts which are needed to balance the budget, the Hartford Courant reports.
However, Democratic leaders pushed back and said they are willing to discuss spending cuts and on Saturday House Speaker J. Brendan Sharkey, D-Hamden, tweeted a picture of two empty chairs and wrote, “Saturday, working on the budget #WaitingForMalloy.”
The Governor’s spokesman responded also on social media stating that Malloy is waiting for Democratic leaders to put forth “real” spending reductions.
The Connecticut Mirror reports this weekend that Malloy and Democratic leaders are still hundreds of millions of dollars apart on spending cuts.
Catch up on the top CT Patch stories of the month:
And the news doesn’t get any better as the state is already looking at $2.2 billion deficits in 2017-18 and 2018-19.
Read the full Courant story here.
Read the full CT News Junkie story here.
Read the full CT Mirror story here.
Get more local news delivered straight to your inbox. Sign up for free Patch newsletters and alerts.
