Ways & Means hears revised Budget Adjustment Act that strips several new spending items

Emily Byrne, Joint Fiscal Office staff, briefed the legislative Ways & Means committee on a revised edition of the Budget Adjustment Act and said the bill removes a number of spending items that had appeared in the governor’s recommended adjustment and the earlier H.141 version.

"There are some changes," Byrne told the committee, and she walked members through the high-level bullets in the revised proposal.

Byrne said the revised bill returns $14 million to the treasurer’s appropriation that had earlier been moved to other uses after the summer floods. "There’s $14,000,000 going to the treasurer for bond redemption costs," she said. That $14 million had been moved earlier from the treasurer’s appropriation and, in a prior House-Senate version, was allocated elsewhere, primarily to the Vermont Housing and Conservation Board; the new edition restores the money to the treasurer.

The revised bill does not create two positions that H.141 had added in the Attorney General’s Office and the Human Rights Commission; Byrne said that omission reduces appropriations by about $67,000, representing roughly two months of funding for the positions. "The new budget adjustment does not create those positions," she said.

Byrne outlined other cuts and changes: language in the bill continues the extension of the cold-weather rules for the General Assistance Emergency Housing program through June 30, but the updated version does not include the roughly $1.84 million appropriation that had been added earlier. Byrne said the Department for Children and Families is expected to use savings within the general assistance emergency housing program to cover the extension; no new money is included in the revised bill.

The revised proposal removes an approximately $1.6 million, one-time appropriation for grants to municipalities impacted by the 2024 summer floods and eliminates about $3.6 million in one-time housing funds to "BHCB" that had appeared in the earlier version. Byrne also said funding for the completion of a pilot project linked to Act 186 of 2022 was removed; the transcript records inconsistent figures for that pilot (the speaker referenced $2.6 million and other nearby amounts), and the precise final figure was not specified in the briefing.

The bill also changes the year‑end construct that governed roughly $133.7 million in unallocated funds under H.141. Byrne said the revised language instead reserves a specific amount (about $133.5 million based on the changes) to carry forward into FY2026 without transferring it to the previously used cash fund; any amount above that specific reservation would be subject to the usual year‑end allocation to the rainy day fund and the teachers' and state employees' pensions.

Byrne said a reversion of earlier judiciary funds, which the House-Senate H.141 had allowed the judiciary to retain for network and IT security investments and to create an ADA-accessible bathroom at the Essex Meeting House, is restored in the revised bill so the funds revert to the general fund. The transcript lists $850,000 for network and security investments and $50,000 for the Essex Meeting House bathroom in the earlier reallocation that will not be reappropriated under the revised version.

Byrne also summarized items the governor sought to add to the adjustment. She said the governor’s recommended adjustment included an increase to provider stabilization grants and an $11 million payment to the Brattleboro Retreat as a current-year payment; the revised bill incorporates a roughly $6 million increase for provider stabilization beyond an earlier $4 million appropriation and a roughly $11 million payment for the Brattleboro Retreat. When asked which providers would receive the stabilization funding, Byrne said those grants would target "other community based" health-care providers and not hospitals: "it's not hospitals. It's sort of other community based provider. Healthcare providers."

Committee members then prepared to take a vote on the current proposal; the transcript records committee members pausing and taking a break before an outcome was recorded. Representative Lovett told the committee that the proposal would force difficult choices in his district, saying it asked his community "to choose between hundred plus exits from 3 hotels in my district." The transcript shows the committee recessed for a 10-minute break before a recorded vote or final disposition appears in this excerpt.

All dollar amounts and program names in this article reflect the figures and program titles as stated in the transcript briefing or are noted as not specified where the transcript was unclear.