Massachusetts Governor Charlie Baker has signed an overdue $43 billion dollar state budget into law, hours before a stopgap spending plan for state government was about to expire.
The signing Wednesday came after the Republican spent more than a week reviewing the budget that was delivered to him by the Democratic-controlled Legislature on July 22, three weeks after the start of the state's new fiscal year. A temporary budget has kept the state operating since July 1, but that spending authority was due to run out today.
State Representative John Barrett, a North Adams Democrat, says while the budget increases local education funding, schools in his district won’t see any additional money.
“With an increase of $267 million, absolutely had no impact on the communities and school systems that I represent,” Barrett told WAMC. “I think that is a result of the [funding] formula which is badly outdated and also it’s been tinkered with several times over the years.”
The new budget does not raise taxes but increases overall spending by 3.3 percent over the most recent fiscal year. It projects state tax collections to rise 1.4 percent over the preliminary revenue estimates for the 12-month period that ended June 30.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
