Correctional officers in a statewide union say that a 5 percent pay increase lawmakers have proposed in the state budget is not sufficient to stymie the corruption and reduce physical dangers they face every day. 

UPDATED: Budget negotiations stretched late into the evening on Wednesday, but lawmakers said privately they didn’t expect to announce a deal until Thursday. 

Gov. Rick Perry unveiled a four-point, $1.6 billion business tax relief plan Monday that includes an across-the-board rate reduction of the business franchise tax.

Leaders in the Legislature decided this was the year to move more than $6 billion in income off the books. While they argue it improves budget transparency in the long term, in the short term it creates the illusion that this year's budget plan is growing less than it is.

The first budgets from the House and Senate are out, marked by their authors as mere starting points. Here's how they compare to each other, and to the current budget.

The state's top budget authority, the Legislative Budget Board, says lawmakers will have trouble accessing billions of dollars in the Rainy Day Fund without busting the state's spending cap.  

As lawmakers try to trim the budget for health care for prison inmates, one bill aims to cut costs by re-examining a program that releases inmates deemed the oldest, sickest and most expensive.

A Legislative Budget Board report on how government can be more effective has recommended that the state reduce its gas tax exemption for hydraulic fracturing.

State officials this month will consider privatizing a state hospital. But the plan faces pushback from state lawmakers worried about potential conflicts of interest and other sticking points.

This week on the Newsreel, check out our guide to upcoming Texas political races. And, with the runoffs out of the way, lawmakers start talking about the session ahead — and the state budget.

The Texas Alcoholic Beverage Commission hopes a pair of apps will increase safety and compliance next year during spring break.

Experts speculate that a key factor in the increase in reports of child abuse and neglect is the struggling economy. The number of reported cases of abuse has grown 6 percent in Texas since 2008, before the recession.

House and Senate negotiators agreed on spending on education, state salaries and benefits this morning and hope to have the final vote on the 2012-13 budget sometime this weekend.

House and Senate negotiators have reached agreement on everything in the state budget except for public and higher education and a section of general provisions that can be used later to make sure the numbers in the budget balance.

Gov. Rick Perry says he is unswayed by estimates that the state's Rainy Day Fund may end up being more flush than previously anticipated and blasted the Legislature's budget office as an unreliable source of numbers.

Solving the state's 2012-13 budget woes is a hard job and perhaps the best way to show that is to let you decide for yourself how the $27 billion shortfall should be closed. Use our interactive budget shortfall app to see what you're willing to give up to close the gap. 

The Big Men on Campus in the school known as the Texas Legislature have the unenviable job of finding money that might alleviate the massive cuts outlined in House Bill 1, the general appropriations bill for the next biennium.

Cutting the budget can be expensive. Something that appears to save money can, on further inspection, cost more. Family planning, for instance.