NEWS FLASH: This year’s Connecticut Budget deficit jumps to $415 million

Dec 03

jonpeltoBen Barnes (OPM Secretary), Budget Cuts, Malloy, State Budget, State Deficit , , , 7 Comments

“Comptroller Kevin Lembo today announced that the state is currently on track to end Fiscal Year 2013 with a deficit of at least $415 million based on current spending patterns and revenue projections.”

Although just last week, Ben Barnes, Malloy’s budget chief, continued to maintain that the deficit was $365 million, State Comptroller Lembo has set the record straight.  It is $50 million higher than the Malloy administration has admitted and continues to grow larger.

According to Lembo’s press release, “Statewide agency appropriations projected to year end are running above their appropriated levels even after consideration of OPM’s estimated deficiency appropriations…Medicaid – the largest single gross appropriation line-item in the budget – is significantly above the budget target.

To translate that into common speech, even as late as last week, the Malloy Administration was finding it impossible to tell the truth.

When putting together the budget, the Malloy Administration underestimated what the state would need to cover Medicaid expenses.  In addition, the Malloy Administration claimed it would achieve savings it never achieved and finally, the poor economy has meant that the number of Medicaid cases as grown.  As of now, Malloy’s Medicaid budget missed the mark by more than a quarter of a billion dollars.

Incredibly, even now, Malloy and his handlers refuse to come clean with the Connecticut media or the public.

Check back later for updates from the Connecticut media as they become available.

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  • Suesylvester

    I cannot read anymore about the budget…every newspaper reports a different number and different story. My head is spinning..enough is enough. Maybe that was the point of all the misinformation…make people sick of hearing it and not know really what to believe!

    • Juliet Anderson

      As conspiratorial as that sounds you may be onto something here. Confuse the people with enough gorilla dust to wear them down into a state of throwing up their collective hands and proclaiming loudly, I DON’T CARE ANYMORE!!!!!!!!!

      • Suesylvester

        We call it collusion,…and yeah I think collusion is real. “Wear them down till they go away” is Hartford’s motto.

  • Gloria Leonard

    Once the overall economy in the United States improves, and it will very soon, that rising tide will help lift Connecticut back to prosperity. Governor Malloy has put a solid foundation under Connecticut already. Economic growth will wipe away all the deficit problems. It will accelerate once the republicans in congress agree to raise income tax rates back to those during the Clinton administration. But only on those families making $250,000 per year or more. Then and only then will you see the US economy come roaring back.

    • msavage

      While I agree that the income tax rate for those making more than $250K needs to go up, unfortunately, I do not share your optimism re how much of a positive effect that will have on the American economy. I also do not agree that Gov. Malloy has “put a solid foundation under Conn.”

    • Linda174

      Malloy and solid foundation together in the same sentence, really? Are you for real?

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