The House passed its version of the state’s fiscal 2024 spending plan late Wednesday afternoon, a slightly ballooned version of Gov. Maura Healey’s late winter budget offering which will now head to the Senate for further revision.
Coming in at $56.2 billion, the budget makes free school meals for all of the Commonwealth’s students permanent, carries through on Healey’s plan to provide free community college to adults without degrees and moves the state lottery online, among other initiatives.
“From critical investments in healthcare and workforce development, to funding for new initiatives that are designed to increase educational opportunities, better support working families, and provide for a safer and more reliable public transportation system, the House’s FY24 budget will help to make Massachusetts more affordable for residents, while allocating support for the Commonwealth’s most consequential institutions,” House Speaker Ron Mariano said in a written statement.
A mass of the budget, about $20 billion, will be used to fund the state’s MassHealth insurance program.
The budget evenly splits the about $1 billion expected to come in from the state’s new millionaire’s tax, a 4% surtax on incomes over $1 million, between transportation and education initiatives, with a full $250 million scheduled to go to the MBTA for capital improvements.
The spending plan also proposes sending billions more toward the state’s rainy day fund, eventually bringing it to a historic high of over $9 billion.
The Massachusetts Fiscal Alliance criticized the spending plan, highlighting a bottom line they say is a full 13.3% higher than last year.
“While the state waits to see what kind of negative impact the recently passed income tax surcharge will have on the state’s economy and our economic competitiveness, that concern did not discourage Speaker Ron Mariano from proposing the largest state budget proposal in state history and piling on even more spending over the course of the last three days,” said Paul Diego Craney, spokesman for the group. “For Speaker Mariano, he’s living like he just won the lottery and this week’s budget process proved that House lawmakers have no limit to what they can spend.”
Lawmakers passed the budget with with a unanimous, 156-0 vote.
Mariano praised this year’s budget process, calling it “as efficient and stress-free as any budget in the past 32 I’ve done.”