LAS VEGAS (KTNV) — "This is a budget that is centered and balanced on the promise of not raising taxes."
That's what Governor Joe Lombardo said during his State of the State address less than a week ago. However, some lawmakers are questioning that after discovering the proposed budget that the governor's office submitted has a $335 million budget deficit.
WATCH FULL STATE OF THE STATE ADDRESS
On Tuesday, the Legislative Commission's Budget Subcommittee met to go over the budget. Several subcommittee members voiced their frustrations and said they feel like they're already behind even though the 2025 state legislative session doesn't officially begin until Feb. 3.
"I will just say that receiving a budget that is not balanced and has, frankly, a lot of errors and mistakes has made that more difficult for us," Speaker Steve Yeager, (D-Las Vegas), said. "I feel like we're entering these budget subcommittee hearings really behind the eight ball and behind where we should be and would like to be at this point."
Just before the meeting began, Governor Lombardo's office announced that Tiffany Greenameyer had been appointed as the new Director of the Governor's Office of Finance, replacing Amy Stephenson.
"Tiffany's deep expertise in budget and fiscal issues will be a tremendous asset, and I look forward to her leadership," the governor's office said in a statement.
Greenameyer told the subcommittee that over the past three days, she had been working with the finance team, which includes about 30 people, on amendments to bring down the deficit to $85 million.
As Greenameyer began to go over some of the proposed changes between the original budget and a revised budget, subcommittee members stated they hadn't received enough information about them to adequately prepare for the meeting.
"To say that I'm frustrated that I've spent, since the State of the State, when this budget was released, preparing for today's hearing to ask questions to only find out that proposed amendments were presented in an exhibit submitted to the committee yesterday and these are proposed amendments is beyond frustrating," said Sen. Rochelle Nguyen, (D-Las Vegas). "I wouldn't even know where to begin asking questions."
Even though Greenameyer said the amendments would bring the deficit down to $85 million, she didn't go into further specifics about what exactly was being cut or adjusted to account for that number.
"In the slides, you're just getting the total number but I will work with fiscal staff to make sure they have a breakdown of the budget amendments that we are requesting," Greenameyer said.
There were several issues that subcommittee members brought up, including moving $120 million in one-time funding that had already been allocated to the state's general fund, which is not allowed. According to subcommittee members, that includes money for things like $14 million in tax credits for the Athletics' stadium and $5 million in wildlife crossings for the Nevada Department of Transportation.
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During his State of the State address, Lombardo said he wanted to make teacher pay raises permanent as well as expand raises to charter school teachers.
However, subcommittee members questioned if that was budgeted properly as well as the governor's other priority bills.
"In the budget that was submitted to us, we see one top-line number for what they may cost. How that is paid for is different if those include ongoing expenses versus those that are one-time," said Senate Majority Leader Nicole Cannizzaro, (D-Las Vegas). "If those are all one-time funds, that's a line item on a budget that we can say okay, is there money for that or not. But as you have indicated, it appears that several of these bills have ongoing administrative expenses, which are positions, offices, ongoing expenses, things that might fall into the education aspect that might be ongoing as well ... That also has to be accounted for within the revenues that are available in ongoing, not revenues that are balanced in that budget. That is also a piece that is concerning."
Cannizzaro did clarify the way that the budget was submitted to them, the priority bills look like they include one-time funding. However, lawmakers haven't seen the language of those bills.
I asked Governor Lombardo's office about the state budget being unbalanced and a spokesperson addressed those concerns.
"Last session, the Legislature appropriated one-time funds for teacher raises and preschool expansion, leaving educators and parents wondering whether funding would be available in future years. As he said in his State of the State speech last week, Governor Lombardo is committed to making teacher raises and Pre-K education permanent. As such, he included the raises in his budget as ongoing operating expenses rather than a one-time cost. The Governor hopes the Legislature shares his commitment to teachers and parents and will join him in making these expenditures permanent. The executive budget remains balanced through one-time funding."
Cannizzaro told the governor's staff that amendments and proposed changes should be submitted to the subcommittee by 5 p.m. on Jan. 29.
Debi Reynolds, Governor Lombardo's Deputy Chief of Staff, told subcommittee members that their team was working hard to fix the budget issues but that two weeks, between the State of the State address and the proposed deadline, wasn't enough time to go over everything.
However, Cannizzaro stopped Reynolds before she could finish saying the governor's team has had plenty of time to troubleshoot ahead of the legislative session.
Lawmakers have until the end of the legislative session to pass a state budget for the 2025-2027 biennium.
You can see the budget presentation that lawmakers went over below.
