ST. PAUL
The Minnesota Legislature's nine budget bills fall more than $1 billion short, Gov. Mark Dayton's key advisors say.
"While the bills purport to resolve the $5 billion deficit, they do not," Revenue Commissioner Myron Frans and Commissioner Jim Schowalter of Minnesota Management and Budget wrote in a letter today to Republican legislative leaders.
The two said they hope negotiations that began this week to resolve differences between House and Senate spending and tax bills fill the gap.
The commissioners wrote that the bills have a variety of holes, such as counting on receiving federal money that may not be available and overestimating savings lawmakers booked for some programs.
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Schowalter and Frans complained that some GOP-controlled committees did not use fiscal information compiled by the administration. As former House Speaker Steve Sviggum, R-Kenyon, put it on Monday, legislators and the Dayton administration have yet to agree on fundamental numbers.
The House and Senate each has passed eight spending bills and a tax bill. While one funding agriculture programs received negotiators' approval Monday, the rest are just getting started in the conference committee process.
Legislative leaders say they do not expect most conference committees to finish before a week-long Easter and Passover break that begins Monday. When they return to work on April 26, they will have three weeks left to finish a $34 billion or larger two-year budget.
Don Davis reports for Forum Communications Co., which owns the Herald.
