Budget is a precarious balancing act

benbarnesHARTFORD – Benjamin Barnes, secretary of the Office of Policy and Management, made his pitch yesterday to the budget-setting Appropriations Committee on where to fill the $178.9-million deficit in the budget that runs through June 30.

The shortfalls include $108 million in the Department of Social Services’ Medicaid account, $5 million in the Department of Emergency Services and Public Protection, about $4.9 million in overtime within the Department of Correction, $18 million in the Department of Transportation, $8.5 million in the account to fund adjudicated claims, $6 million in the state Public Defenders and $380,000 in the Department of Agriculture.

Some of the revenue would be transferred from other state entities, including the Biomedical Research Trust Fund, supported by the nationwide settlement with Big Tobacco, of about $9.4 million and $15.2 million from the Connecticut Investment Act. But Barnes told the committee that new appropriations would be balanced by rescissions to balance the budget within the constitutional spending cap.