Montgomery, AL – A state Senate committee has approved a $1.9 billion General Fund budget that would improve funding for some health and social service programs while cutting appropriations for many other functions of government.
The Democrat-controlled State Finance and Taxation-General Fund Committee passed the budget Thursday and sent it to the Senate for consideration.
The committee left the budget for fiscal 2009 mostly as it was when the House approved it last week. But it did make one major change. The House had provided for some non-health and non-social service agencies to be cut as much as 11 percent if the governor's revenue estimates for next year aren't met. The Senate committee changed that to 17 percent due to a judge's ruling that knocked $63 million out of the budget. The judge said the governor erred when he put $63 million into the General Fund instead of a state savings account called the Alabama Trust Fund.
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