Conference committee reviews HB 1/HB 2 side‑by‑side; several department restorations held or approved

The Committee of Conference on HB 1 and HB 2 spent the bulk of its meeting walking through a side‑by‑side comparison of budget language and back‑of‑the‑budget sections, adopting some technical corrections and deferring or holding decisions on multiple large items.

Why it matters: The Committee of Conference reconciles House and Senate differences in the biennial budget. The panel’s decisions will determine which agency appropriations and statutory changes move forward in final budget language.

What the committee agreed and held

- Technical and minor edits: Staff walked the committee through a detailed change sheet dated June 13, 2025. The panel adopted a Senate clarification in one Department of Information Technology back‑of‑budget item to remove the word “shared” to clarify distribution of a cut; the committee agreed to the Senate wording.

- Restorations and holds: The committee repeatedly “held” (deferred) decisions on several large or politically sensitive packages so they could be discussed in more detail later. These included the Department of Corrections reorganization (the committee said that discussion will be lengthy and placed it on hold), major human‑services restores—community mental‑health funding and developmental‑services wait‑list funding—and multiple education trust‑fund vs. general‑fund allocations, including whether lottery proceeds should be routed to education adequacy grants.

- Specific approvals: The committee approved a small number of agency requests that were described as technical or already funded: the governor’s commission on disability received restored positions (a small general‑fund and federal‑fund mix), and staff agreed to adopt the Senate position on some environmental and cultural agency footnote technical corrections. The committee also accepted the Senate position to move a court contract for involuntary mental‑health admissions from one judicial unit to another, to avoid a gap in representation funding.

- Revenue and timing: Committee members scheduled a follow‑up meeting to reconcile revenue estimates; topline revenue decisions remain a gating item for several holds. Members planned to meet with revenue staff early the following week to attempt to resolve differences and to receive updated lottery modeling and retirement valuations.

Selected quotes and procedural notes

- “Alright. We'll call a committee of conference on h b 1 and h b 2 to order,” the committee chair said at the start of the session.

- Committee staff: “On page 1, you can see shaded out is legislative branch, executive department, department administrative services, specifically, house 1 only...” — staff repeatedly explained which sections the committee had already tentatively agreed and which still required discussion.

- On meals and rooms: the House proposed capping the meals‑and‑rooms distribution; the Senate opposed that cap. The committee left that issue on hold after extended committee discussion and disagreement over the policy and distribution formula.

What comes next

Members directed staff to prepare cleaned side‑by‑side documents with the committee’s agreed edits grayed out and to circulate the updated draft before the next meeting. The committee set a near‑term deadline to reconcile revenue estimates and asked departments and the retirement system for formal valuations and lists of affected cohorts where pension language is concerned.