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LePage Will Have Fully Drafted Budget Prepared For His Successor

Wikipedia
The Blaine House, the official residence of the Governor of Maine, located in Augusta.

Gov. Paul Lepage will have an early Christmas present for his successor: a fully drafted state budget that the next governor can use to build their own proposed tax and spending plan.

The newly- elected governor will have to submit the new two-year budget in February, just weeks after taking office. Finance Commissioner Alec Porteous says his office will have a fully drafted budget for the governor elect next month.

“We would readily acknowledge that, depending on who is elected, they will take or leave more or less of the alternate budget we hand on,” says Porteous.

LePage’s proposals around Medicaid expansion are controversial. What will mostly benefit the new governor is all the drafting work on the 90 percent of the budget that is not controversial and that keeps state government operating.

“The governor talked to me late last year about expediting the budget process and getting the budget proposal done that he will hand on to his successor in November, rather than two months later,” Porteous says.

Originally published Oct. 18, 2018 at 11:3o a.m. ET.

Journalist Mal Leary spearheads Maine Public's news coverage of politics and government and is based at the State House.