Gov. Jim Pillen sent a message to lawmakers May 24 announcing millions in line-item vetoes to a variety of programs and proposals contained in two components of the state budget package passed last week.<\/p>\n
The governor said the cuts are meant to ensure that funds are available for \u201ctransformative tax relief\u201d while still providing quality services to the state\u2019s residents.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe must continue to fight against excessive governmental spending to deliver dollars back into the pockets of Nebraskans,\u201d Pillen said.<\/p>\n
Among the governor\u2019s cuts to LB814, the mainline budget bill, were $15.3 million in general fund appropriations for Medicaid reimbursement rates and $6 million for child welfare provider rate increases.<\/p>\n
Pillen said the state\u2019s hospitals have seen \u201crecord profits\u201d in recent years and that increasing reimbursement rates would not address systemic workforce shortages.<\/p>\n
Other general fund appropriations vetoed were:
\n\u2022\t$107,250 to the Nebraska Commission for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing for a full-time sign language interpreter;
\n\u2022\t$470,000 to the Nebraska State Historical Society;
\n\u2022\t$500,000 to expand the state\u2019s court appointed special advocate program;
\n\u2022\t$510,700 to the attorney general\u2019s office for interstate water litigation and a trial preparation coordinator position;
\n\u2022\t$848,700 for a new state auditor position and salary increases;
\n\u2022\t$1.8 million for the expansion of home visitation care;
\n\u2022\t$1 million for a facility to house pregnant and parenting homeless youth;
\n\u2022\t$1.9 million in funding to the state Supreme Court;
\n\u2022\t$2.2 million for legislative branch salary increases; and
\n\u2022\t$7 million to the state Department of Environment and Energy for grants to support a rural drinking water project in Cedar and Knox counties.<\/p>\n
Pillen also vetoed $40 million in cash fund transfers from LB818 to the Rural Workforce Housing Investment Fund and the Middle Income Housing Investment Fund. The state has invested more than $200 million in affordable housing over the last three years, he said, which developers are leveraging to build up the state\u2019s affordable housing supply.<\/p>\n
Other cash transfers vetoed were:
\n\u2022\t$20 million from the Shovel Ready Capital Recovery and Investment Act;
\n\u2022\t$10 million to the Site and Building Development Fund for a ground-based nuclear deterrence project near Kimball; and
\n\u2022\t$10 million from the Nebraska Health Care Cash Fund for a pilot program on PTSD related to gun violence.<\/p>\n
Pillen said his vetoes would save $94.2 million in general funds, $10 million from the Health Care Cash fund and $87 million from the state\u2019s Cash Reserve Fund over the next four years.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe must cut government spending, we must cut government red tape and we must lead the charge in investing in our next generation,\u201d Pillen said.<\/p>\n
The Appropriations Committee must report on the fiscal impact of the vetoes within one day and may offer a motion to override any or all of them. Thirty votes are required to override a veto.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Gov. Jim Pillen sent a message to lawmakers May 24 announcing millions in line-item vetoes to a variety of programs and proposals contained in two components of the state budget package passed last week.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"colormag_page_container_layout":"default_layout","colormag_page_sidebar_layout":"default_layout","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-34458","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-appropriations"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34458","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=34458"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34458\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=34458"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=34458"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=34458"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}