The legislature’s Appropriations Committee has voted unanimously for a $7.5 million supplemental budget to pay bills owed this budget year.
Rep. Drew Gattine, a democrat from Westbrook, says it’s a small budget bill with non-controversial items.
“It spends money for disaster relief for communities, a few hundred communities related to some storms in the last few years. It provides money for the bicentennial commission,” Gattine says.
The only significant change in the budget from what Gov. Janet Mills proposed is that the money all comes from the balance in the general fund, and does not use some one-time, left-over money in the biomass subsidy program. Panel members say what to do with that money will be decided in the two-year state budget that starts July 1.
“Spending doesn’t always go as planned whether we are in good economic times or bad economic times,” says Gattine. “This is a pretty normal process. It’s what I would call a pretty skinny spending package.”
