With only 14 legislative days left in this year’s meeting of the Kentucky General Assembly, lawmakers have yet to pass a budget.
State Rep. Gerald Watkins of Paducah says he fears the session will adjourn without a budget compromise, which will require Republican Gov. Matt Bevin to call for a special session.
Watkins, who serves on the Budget Review Subcommittee on Postsecondary Education, says the Democratic-controlled House of Representatives will not accept the proposed cuts to higher education funding over the next two and a half years. Governor Bevin's proposed budget called for a 4.5 percent rescission during this fiscal year and a 9 percent cut to base funding for the commonwealth's two-year budget.
“We’re not accepting the governor’s budget as it is," Watkins said. "My fear is that we’ll adjourn without a budget, but we need one, certainly, and that would mean we’d have to have a special session and the cost associated with that. We need a budget in place by July 1.”
Watkins says a special session would cost around $50,000 a day with a minimum of five days required. Kentucky's fiscal year ends June 30.
On Friday, House Speaker Greg Stumbo told the Louisville Courier-Journal that the Democrats' goal is to restore all of Bevin's proposed higher ed cuts for the biennium budget.
Watkins said he doesn’t think the issue will turn into a drawn-out, Illinois-like budget impasse. Those stagnant budget talks led to Southern Illinois University officials outlining this week more than 400 layoffs that could be on the table.
“We’re in a lot better shape financially than Illinois is and we haven’t had to pass corruption problems that they’ve had and our politics isn’t as partisan, I don’t think, or extreme as theirs is, as far as not being able to work together," Watkins said.
Bevin, meanwhile, called on Democrats to "get serious" about passing his budget earlier this week in a viral video filmed inside the House chambers.
