With just days left until Indiana Governor Mitch Daniels submits his plan for the budget that will be negotiated during the special session, some legislative leaders are laying down a few of their stipulations for that budget. Indiana Public Broadcasting’s Marianne Holland reports.
A new revenue forecast presented to the state budget committee today shows a more than one billion dollar shortfall from previous forecasts in the money the Indiana legislature has to come up with the state’s next budget during a special session to be called next month. Indiana Public Broadcasting’s Marianne Holland reports.
On Saturday, eighteen children from across the state will become the last class to graduate from the more than 70 year old program for troubled youth called the Indiana Soldiers and Sailors Children’s Home in the central Indiana community of Knightstown. The rest of the children will be sent their homes or to foster care scattered across the state. Indiana Public Broadcasting’s Marianne Holland takes a look back at the school’s history, why the school is closing, and what’s next for the facility.
Indiana Governor Mitch Daniels has signed into law a bill that supporters say will give teachers more legal protection when disciplining students. Indiana Public Broadcasting’s Marianne Holland reports.
Indiana General Assembly leaders announced today that efforts to write a new biennial state budget will begin Tuesday with an eye toward conducting a special session to approve a final budget agreement in mid-June. Indiana Public Broadcasting’s Marianne Holland reports.
A report from Families USA, a national organization for health care consumers, reveals that approximately one point four million people in Indiana families are spending more than ten percent of their pre-tax income on health care costs. The report also shows a 47 percent increase since the year 2000 in the number of Hoosiers who are paying a quarter of their pre-tax income on health care. Ron Pollack is the executive director of Families USA.
“As our findings make clear, high health care costs are not just a problem of the uninsured. More and more families with health insurance are affected by rising health care costs, and for many, the burden of these costs in becoming too great to bear.”
There is no specific bill on health care reform before Congress, but Pollack says bills are expected in both the U.S. Senate and House before Memorial Day. Pollack says while those bills are far from finalized, they will likely target rising costs, getting more people insured, and insurance reform, to crack down on current policies that deny health care benefits to people for things like pre-existing conditions. Committees are expected to vote on a health care reform bill in June, with floor votes coming as soon as July.
During the legislative session that ended last week, environmentalists were hoping for tougher green regulations, as legislation they supported on a variety of environmental matters advanced further than most political observers ever thought possible. But at the same time budget negotiations were falling apart, so too were agreements over a bill to require more green power in the Hoosier state. While a budget failure means a certain special session, some believe the advancement of few green policies is another mark on Indiana’s already tarnished environmental record. Indiana Public Broadcasting’s Marianne Holland spoke with Hoosier Environmental Council executive director Jesse Kharbanda, about the 2009 session and the environment.
April revenue reports, released today, show the state brought in about 255 million dollars less than expected. Indiana Governor Mitch Daniels says that number means legislators will need to cut a billion dollars more than expected when they return for a special session. Daniels says despite the declines and lack of predictability, he still does not support a one year budget, as proposed by House Democrats.
“I honestly think there’s another way, there are other ways, to accomplish the same thing and to deal with that uncertainty. A budget could be written with triggers that say that more spending can be added if revenues surprise on the up side or more spending can be subtracted if revenues continue to disappoint on the down side.”
Income tax revenues were down thirty one percent from a year ago and sales tax collections also dropped twelve percent. Governor Daniels says he wants a new revenue forecast from the state budget committee before he will call a special session. After failing to pass a budget during the regular session that ended last week, lawmakers must now approve a budget before the new fiscal year begins on July first.
