Tennessee Senate approves $59.8 billion budget; tabled effort to cut school voucher start-up funding

The Tennessee Senate on Wednesday approved the legislature's fiscal 2025-26 spending plan, adopting House Bill 14-09 as the conference-conformed appropriations measure and voting 30-2 to pass the package on third and final consideration.

Leader Johnson opened the budget debate by describing the measure as “a $59,800,000,000 state budget.” He told senators the proposal used a conservative revenue forecast and included agency reductions while preserving a large rainy-day reserve.

The legislative amendment to the governor’s proposal, described to the body by Chairman Watson of the Senate Finance, Ways and Means Committee, redirected recurring and nonrecurring items to fund Senate priorities without increasing the bottom line. “This legislative amendment…truly reflects the priorities of the Senate,” Chairman Watson said while outlining the changes.

Why it matters: the package directs funds across education, health, infrastructure and disaster relief at a time senators said warrants conservative revenue assumptions. Lawmakers and committee chairs framed the plan as balancing one-time and recurring items to protect core services while addressing emergent needs.

Key provisions and numbers included in the amendment and floor discussion: - Education: an additional $244,000,000 toward the Tennessee Investment in Student Achievement (TISA) formula; $27,300,000 for summer learning and $20,000,000 for school-safety grants were highlighted during debate. - Roads and infrastructure: the budget contains a $1,000,000,000 cash injection into the state road fund and a proposal to redirect roughly $80,000,000 per year of tire tax revenue into transportation funding (the tire revenue shift was to be addressed separately in forthcoming legislation). - Health and long-term care: the amendment uses shared savings and other adjustments to provide $95,500,000 to enhance long-term care services and $78,000,000 to TennCare from shared savings to buy back services previously paid for by an assessment fee. - Disaster and local assistance: lawmakers earmarked $20,000,000 in added local match for FEMA disaster relief, $1,200,000 for flood preparedness in West Tennessee, and $25,000,000 nonrecurring for additional disaster relief in Northeast Tennessee. - Local grant pools: the floor summary listed $42,000,000 in legislative grant pools split among categories including volunteer fire departments, rescue squads, EMS, senior centers and local museums; committee and leader comments emphasized those pools touch communities statewide.

Floor amendments and outcomes: - Amendment 8 (filed by Senator Yarborough) sought to remove this year’s funding for the private school voucher program and redirect roughly $150,000,000 into education; after debate the Senate tabled the amendment on a voice/bell vote (tabling motion prevailed), keeping the voucher funding in the adopted budget. - Amendment 9 (filed by Senator Akbari) would have highlighted disparities in funding between the attorney general’s office and public defenders/DAs; Senator Akbari withdrew the amendment after receiving a commitment from leadership to continue the conversation next year. - Amendment 10 (filed by Senator Campbell) proposed a revenue approach to raise more infrastructure dollars; the motion to table amendment 10 prevailed after a recorded bell vote (result recorded on the floor as the tabling motion prevailing). - Multiple draft finance amendments filed by the Finance Committee and individual senators were withdrawn on the floor after leaders explained they were already incorporated into the House-conformed bill.

Procedure and final votes: Leader Johnson moved to conform and substitute the Senate text with House Bill 14-09; after the floor amendments and discussion, the Senate voted to pass the House-conformed bill on third and final consideration. The clerk recorded 30 ayes and 2 nays; the motion to reconsider was laid on the table.

What legislators said: Senator Yarborough, who offered the voucher-removal amendment, argued the state is entering a period of economic uncertainty and said launching a roughly $150 million voucher program now risked future budget pressure. Leader Johnson and Chairman Watson countered that the session and a prior special session had produced the school choice policy and that the budget contains significant new investments in public education concurrently.

Next steps and caveats: the Senate adopted the House-conformed appropriation; the bills that implement bonding or other statutory changes were also taken up on the floor (see Votes at a glance). Lawmakers repeatedly noted the package mixes recurring and nonrecurring items; several leaders said items tied to potential new revenue (for example, from pending bills on vaping or hemp) were deliberately not recognized until those bills pass. Several senators also flagged portability of certain program costs into future budgets, an issue some members said will need further review.

Votes at a glance - House Bill 14-09 (appropriations bill; Senate adoption of House-conformed bill): passed on third and final consideration, ayes 30, nays 2. - House Bill 14-08 (budget implementation/statutory changes): passed on third and final consideration, ayes reported 33, nays 0. - House Bill 14-07 (authorization to issue general obligation bonds for capital projects): passed on third and final consideration, ayes reported 33, nays 0.

Ending note: Sponsors and leaders framed the adopted package as fiscally cautious while providing targeted investments for education, roads, disaster relief and health services. Several senators indicated unresolved questions about long-term revenue and program growth will return to the floor in future sessions.