2004 Budget Session Summary for HB0001

Please Note: The following summaries of legislation enacted during the 2004 Legislative Session were prepared by the Legal Services Division Staff for internal use by the Legislative Service Office.

This report is not an official publication of the Wyoming Legislature and does not purport to be an official statement of legislative intent concerning any measure enacted by the Legislature.

The bill summaries contained in this report were prepared as an aid to locating enacted legislation and as a brief recap of the major provisions of each bill. While the information provided in these summaries is accurate, the summaries are not intended as a detailed abstract and reference should be made to the enacted bills for more complete information.

· K-12 – provides a school foundation program appropriation of $896M plus a $30M transfer from the school foundation account to the school spending policy reserve account. Also appropriated in the bill is $71.8M in major maintenance payments to school districts and $294M in capital construction projects.

· UW – provides a general fund appropriation for the block grant of $288M which includes $17M for the endowment fund (a separate bill, SF 49, provides there will be a total of $18M for the endowment fund). Additional appropriations include $10M in the capital facilities plan for intercollegiate athletics, and $12.5M for the major maintenance funding formula.

· Community colleges – provides a general fund appropriation of $145.2M and $29.8M for the college endowment funds, (a separate bill, SF 6, provides there will be a total of $31.5M for the endowment funds). Also included is $6.7M for public television equipment upgrades.

· Health – provides a general fund appropriation of $511.6M. Additionally, appropriated in the bill is $3.2M general fund for the remainder of the biennium and $13.3M general fund monies to be held in reserve for unforeseen Medicaid liabilities over and above budgeted expenditure levels for 05-06.

· Corrections – provides a general fund appropriation of $59M for capital construction projects at various state correctional facilities, $66.8M for a buyout option on the current bonds for the state penitentiary, and $161.6M for general correctional facilities operations.

· Local governments – provides for a total appropriation to local governments of $119.4M, including mineral royalty grant appropriations of $35M, $1.9M general fund for drinking water revolving fund loans, $25M general fund for business ready communities and $57.5M general fund for two annual direct distributions to cities, towns and counties.

· State employees – provides for total appropriations of $49.8M general fund for maintaining state contributions at 85% for health insurance, 3% per year salary adjustments across the board and some market salary adjustments, and maintaining longevities at $40 per month.

· PMTF transfer – provides for $100M additional deposit in the PMTF, and $74.5M deposit to the spending policy reserve accounts ($44.5 in the PWMTF SPRA and $30M in the common school SPRA).

· Flex authority – provides for the Governor to be able to transfer 10% of the appropriation for a program to other programs within an agency, and 5% of the appropriation for an agency to another agency.

Report required – Contains numerous reporting requirements for the budget period.