As the work of the 194th General Court gets underway, MTF is publishing its 2025 – 2026 Legislative Session Preview. The preview includes 101 primers on the Operating Budget and Capital Investment Plan development processes, as well as seven topic-specific policy briefs that cover a range of public finance and policy issues.
On September 11th, Governor Healey filed her administration’s closeout supplemental budget for Fiscal Year (FY) 2024; roughly two months after the official last day of the fiscal year. A closeout supplemental budget is filed and passed each year; its purpose being to resolve all outstanding deficiencies and ensure that the fiscal year ends in balance. The enactment of this final spending bill will allow the comptroller to “close the books” on FY 2024 and finalize mandated financial reports.
On July 29th, Governor Healey signed the Fiscal Year (FY) 2025 budget; sending back $316.8 million in gross spending vetoes ($248 million net). Inclusive of the Governor’s cuts, line-item spending in the FY 2025 budget would total $57.78 billion, a $1.7 billion (3.1 percent) increase over the FY 2024 GAA.
She also returned three policy sections with amendment, but did not veto any sections in full.
The House and Senate are set to enact a Fiscal Year (FY) 2025 budget, totaling $58.1 billion in line-item spending. It includes $27.5 million more in spending than the House and $16.5 million more than the Senate budget; and total spending exceeds the FY 2024 General Appropriations Act (GAA) by $2 billion, or 3.6 percent.
Fiscal Year (FY) 2025 begins on July 1st, and House and Senate budget negotiators are actively engaging in conversations to craft a compromise budget proposal. The Conference Committee process involves reconciling countless spending, policy, and technical differences between the two bills; and this year, the process will be further impacted by an uncertain fiscal picture for FY 2024 and a more constrained revenue outlook in FY 2025.
The Senate finalized its $58 billion Fiscal Year (FY) 2025 budget this week after adding $89.6 million in spending over the course of three days of debate.
The Senate took action on 1,100 amendments through a combination of standalone votes and amendment ‘bundles,’ which categorically approve or reject many amendments at once. In total, 475 amendments were adopted, 400 were rejected, and 225 were withdrawn from consideration. This brief summarizes Senate debate action and assesses the newly adopted spending and policy proposals.
5 Things to Know About the FY 2025 Senate Amendments
1. Senate members filed 1,100 amendments, 51 more than in FY 2024 and 78 fewer than in FY 2023.
2. The fiscal impact of all amendments is $2.9 billion.
3. An estimated 58% (636) of the amendments are earmarks.
4. Approximately 42% (464) of the amendments are outside policy sections, support programmatic funding increases, or introduce new line-item language.
5. Between FY 2022 – FY 2024, an average of $80 million in additional spending was added during Senate Debate.
Today, the Senate Committee on Ways and Means (SWM) released its budget proposal for Fiscal Year (FY) 2025. The $57.99 billion spending plan includes notable investments in higher education, early education, and mental and behavioral health; increasing spending over the FY 2024 General Appropriations Act (GAA) by $1.9 billion (3.4 percent).
The House finalized its $58.07 billion Fiscal Year (FY) 2025 budget last week after adding $95.8 million in spending over the course of three days of debate.
Two weeks ago, the House Ways and Means Committee released its budget proposal for Fiscal Year (FY) 2025. While the budget development process for the upcoming fiscal year will consume much of the attention in the coming weeks, the FY 2024 fiscal picture remains unclear and will require careful monitoring.
