JFAC corrects FY2025 bookkeeping errors, moves broadband, DEQ and Health & Welfare line items

The Joint Finance and Appropriations Committee on Jan. 17 approved a package of technical corrections to fiscal year 2025 appropriations, shifting how several previously appropriated sums are tracked and correcting how funds were recorded in agency accounts.

The changes are intended to improve accounting transparency and align appropriations with the statutory organization of programs. Committee staff said the motions netted to zero across the general fund and did not change total statewide spending.

Janet Jessup, budget and policy analyst with Legislative Services, told the committee the first correction moves reappropriated broadband monies that were placed in a Department of Commerce program into the newly created Broadband Office so the funding can be tracked separately. “Last year the legislature added the broadband office to the Department of Commerce,” Jessup said, “but that action was taken subsequent to reappropriation being provided. This action would remove the monies that were reappropriated to the commerce program and add them back into the broadband office so they can be tracked for transparency moving forward.”

The committee approved that pair of motions in sequence — one to remove the funds from the commerce program and a second to add the same amount to the broadband program. Both motions passed on roll call with the Senate and House voting unanimously: 20 ayes, 0 nays.

Jessup also described a corrective transfer for the Department of Environmental Quality. She said monies in DEQ’s budget were recorded as if they reduced a general-fund appropriation when they should have been recorded as a transfer from the general fund. The committee approved a one-time transfer of $2,000,000 from the general fund to DEQ’s general fund appropriation so the agency’s budget is “made whole.” That motion likewise passed on a unanimous roll call.

Finally, Jessup presented two classification corrections at the Department of Health and Welfare. In each case certain amounts had been placed in trustee and benefit payments but instead should be appropriated as operating expenditures because the money is paid out through contracts. The committee approved (1) a reclassification of $160,000 from the Idaho Millennium Income Fund for the Substance Abuse Treatment and Prevention program, and (2) a reclassification of $240,000 from the Central Tumor Registry fund in the Physical Health Services program. Both motions passed unanimously.

Each of the motions was described by staff as technical bookkeeping corrections rather than policy changes; the motions were presented as net-zero adjustments that move amounts between expenditure categories or budgeted programs so appropriations align with current statutory program structures.

Committee members required roll-call votes for these items because they create reappropriation authority or transfer funds between statutory categories. Following the votes, members moved on to the program maintenance budget agenda.