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LSO explains budget "decision units": how base, maintenance and enhancements shape appropriations
Summary
Legislative Services Office staff outlined the state's budget-building model (benchmarks 1-6), agency structure, and the distinction between program maintenance, base adjustments and enhancements that JFAC will use to draft appropriation bills.
Jared Tetrault, deputy director and manager of budget and policy at the Legislative Services Office, briefed JFAC on the front-end budget book, agency organization and the decision-unit model used to build Idahos budget.
Tetrault described the state's six benchmark process for constructing appropriations. The benchmarks begin with the prior fiscal years original appropriation (Benchmark 1), move through adjustments (reappropriation, executive carryforward, supplemental appropriations) to derive a total appropriation and estimated current-year expenditures, then reset the base for next year and progress through program-maintenance (benefit changes, contract inflation, statewide cost allocation, employee compensation) to enhancements and finally the next years original appropriation (Benchmark 6).
He explained that agencies are organized under 20 constitutional executive departments and several self-governing agencies; many agencies and divisions appear in the program-maintenance bills even when the statutory department count is 20. Tetrault said the budget book provides standardized pages for each agency: a division summary, fund analysis (appropriation, spending and variances), a comparative request-vs-recommendation table and decision-unit detail pages.
Tetrault emphasized why the decision-unit model matters: it keeps one-time items, base changes and maintenance adjustments separated, which helps the committee and analysts track the fiscal effect of different choices. He noted the governor's program-maintenance request on the general fund equals about $5.4 billion on the maintenance side and that enhancement requests total about $242 million on the general fund in the governor's recommendation.
Ending: Staff said the front-end reports and the budget book pages (available on SharePoint) are intended to provide members and the public consistent, auditable breakdowns as JFAC moves through agency hearings and working groups.
