The latest budget news from The Texas Tribune.
The Senate Finance Committee passed a budget this week that proposes spending about $12 billion more than the House in the next biennium. At first glance, House Appropriations Chair Jim Pitts says there's no way his chamber can meet the Senate halfway. Full Story
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Though secondhand smoke leads to nearly 50,000 U.S. deaths among nonsmoking adults every year, no southern state, including Texas, has adopted a smoke-free law for worksites, restaurants and bars, according to a new CDC report. Full Story
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A $176.5 billion budget for the 2012-13 biennium — 5.9 percent smaller than the current budget but almost $12 billion larger than the version passed earlier by the House — won approval from the Senate Finance Committee Thursday. Full Story
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In this week's jam-packed episode, Evan, Ross, Reeve and Ben discuss higher education reformers, data security at the Comptroller's office, redistricting, the budget, and birthdays. Full Story
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Senate Finance Chair Steve Ogden, R-Bryan, has dropped the news many have been waiting to hear: He wants to attach a contingency provision to the 2012-13 budget that would withdraw $3 billion from the Rainy Day Fund. Full Story
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We’ve annotated the contracts of the 10 highest-paid school superintendents, along with those who lead the state’s 10 largest districts, so readers can view their pay in the context of retirement benefits, performance incentives, and perks like automobile and cellphone allowances. Full Story
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State senators have unveiled a list of almost $5 billion in cash-flow tricks, property sales and fees that could be used to ease cuts in the state budget, but it's not enough to completely close the gap between what they have available and what they hope to spend. Full Story
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Dallas ABC affiliate WFAA-TV was one of four TV stations to interview President Barack Obama. Toward the end, the president got testy with reporter Brad Watson. Full Story
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It doesn’t include a “sick tax.” But the Senate version of the state’s 2012-13 budget still takes direct aim at hospitals, in an effort to find hundreds of millions of dollars in cost savings and narrow the state’s revenue gap. Full Story
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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. Full Story
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As the clock counts down to the end of the regular session on May 30, it’s fair to ask House and Senate leaders — and all members — to meet our needs, not our wants. Here's how they can bridge the multi-billion-dollar gap between their budget plans without any new taxes. Full Story
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Republican lawmakers have vowed to close the budget hole without a new tax. But that hasn’t stopped Sen. Eddie Lucio, D-Brownsville, from proposing a penny per ounce tax on soft drinks. Full Story
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State budget writers should be looking foward this week to finalize a budget that currently seeks to gut billions from current spending levels. But the fight coming doesn’t look like an easy one for either chamber. Full Story
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The 2006 tax swap — lowering local school property taxes and creating a new business tax to make up the difference — is at the center of Texas' current budget troubles. The architects are still pointing fingers over what and whom to blame for the state's “structural deficit.” Full Story
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Hamilton on Victoria's efforts to divorce the University of Houston, Ramshaw on a disagreement between right-to-life groups over laws governing when life ends, E. Smith's TribLive interview with Sen. Kel Seliger and Rep. Burt Solomons on redistricting, Aguilar's interview with the mayor of Juárez, Tan on the continuing hunt for money to buy down budget cuts, Grissom on a psychologist who found more than a dozen inmates mentally competent to face the death penalty, Stiles and yours truly on the House redistricting maps and Galbraith on cutting or killing a tax break for high-cost natural gas producers: The best of our best content from April 11 to 15, 2011. Full Story
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With gasoline costing $1 more than a year ago, budget planners can add fuel expenditures to their list of worries. However, it's also true that oil companies will also pay more in taxes to the state as they beef up their drilling operations. Full Story
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The Texas Legislature is faced with a budget challenge that pits the Republican majority’s desire to cut government spending against a vulnerable target: the frail and the elderly covered by Medicaid and housed in nursing homes. Full Story
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Hours after the state Senate passed a bill Wednesday that would merge the state's two juvenile criminal justice agencies, a House committee passed a similar bill. Full Story
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The president and chief operating officer of the Sam Houston Race Park on legislation that would allow slot machines at horse and dog tracks in Texas, why she believes that's a good idea, and why it has a chance this year. Full Story
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