Four Budget Bills Approved by Senate Finance Committee

The Senate's first major steps in helping finalize a new two-year state budget began Wednesday, June 16, with the Finance Committee's approval of four budget bills. Measures funding state efforts supporting agriculture, broadband development, commerce, energy, higher education, the outdoors and the arts gained the panel's endorsement and were sent to the floor for full Senate action.

Several new and expanded initiatives include free-college grants for kids leaving foster care; streamlining the college admissions process; incentives to increase teachers of color; catalytic converter theft prevention; the creation of a student borrowers' bill of rights; funds for broadband expansion; mental health support for farmers; added support for food shelves; and the detection of Chronic Wasting Disease (CWD) in water.

The four bills advanced to the floor:

S.F. 18 (Tomassoni) Omnibus higher education finance and policy;

S.F. 19 (Dahms) Omnibus commerce and energy policy and finance bill;

S.F. 25 (Westrom) Department of Agriculture, Board of Animal Health, the Agricultural Utilization Research Institute, and Office of Broadband Development budget established; program and an account created; report required; and money appropriated;

S.F. 21 (Ruud) Outdoor heritage, clean water, parks and trails, and arts and cultural heritage funds funding provided; prior appropriations extended and modified; outdoor heritage fund money use restrictions modified; joint exercise of powers provisions modified; reports required; and money appropriated.

*This copy has been updated to correct an error. The extension of the health care reinsurance program is not included in SF 19, as previously stated. The extension of the reinsurance program passed the Senate during the 2021 regular session, but it is not included in the agreed-upon omnibus commerce and energy bill..