Massachusetts Senate Democrats rolled out a $61 billion spending plan for fiscal yr 2026 that will increase spending by 6.3% over final yr’s state funds and rejects a sequence of tax will increase that Gov. Maura Healey pitched in January.
The Senate’s funds writing committee launched its proposal Tuesday as Beacon Hill Democrats are nonetheless grappling with uncertainty attributable to federal funding cuts, efforts to cut back the dimensions of the federal authorities, and a possible slash to federal spending on Medicaid.
Senate funds chief Michael Rodrigues stated lawmakers are placing ahead a spending invoice “based on the facts that we know today.”
“Everyone I know is concerned about what might change in D.C. over the next few months,” the Westport Democrat stated. “We hear a lot of rumors, we hear a lot of threats, we hear proposals, then retractions from proposals. We will move forward and adjust going forward when we know the facts.”
The Senate’s fiscal 2026 funds plan boosts spending by 6.3% over fiscal yr 2025 however is available in $647 million decrease than the $62 billion proposal Healey put ahead earlier this yr and over $100 million decrease than the funds Home Democrats shepherded via their chamber final week.
Rodrigues stated prices for MassHealth, the state’s Medicaid program, are surging by $2.3 billion or 11.7% over fiscal yr 2025. Different well being and human providers expenditures are additionally up by 5.3%, whereas insurance coverage prices for public workers are spiking by 10.8%.
A overwhelming majority of the spending will increase in fiscal yr 2026 are “functionally non-discretionary,” Rodrigues stated, whereas all different spending hikes account for less than $59 million, or lower than 1% of the state funds.
“Unless we want to slash services and programs that we provide to our citizens, there’s very, very little we can do in any of these line items,” Rodrigues stated.
However Rodrigues warned that if Congress strikes to chop Medicaid funding to states, Massachusetts may discover itself in a dire state of affairs.
Congressional Republicans are advancing a funds blueprint that would lower well being and human providers spending by $880 million, a goal consultants have stated can’t be met with out slashing Medicaid funding.
“If they make significant reductions in Medicaid reimbursements, all bets are off, because that is over a billion dollars a month, I think, in MassHealth reimbursements to the Commonwealth of Massachusetts,” he stated.
Senate Democrats, like their counterparts within the Home, didn’t embrace a sequence of tax will increase that Healey wrote into her fiscal yr 2026 spending proposal.
The primary-term Democrat from Arlington sought to spice up total spending by 7.4% partially by making use of the gross sales tax to sweet purchases, imposing the room occupancy excise tax on complimentary resort rooms, and subjecting artificial nicotine to the tobacco excise tax.
The governor additionally pursued a sequence of pharmaceutical-related tax insurance policies and tried to cap charitable donation tax deductions, although she backed off the latter after some pushback.
“I believe the Senate has met and prioritized fiscal responsibility for Massachusetts in this budget. Our goal is to always be prudent stewards of taxpayer dollars, and at the same time, we invest in our people, our programs, our vulnerable populations, our communities with no new tax dollars,” Senate President Karen Spilka stated.
Democratic management within the Senate proposed spending within the fiscal yr 2026 funds practically $2 billion in income from a surtax on incomes over $1 million by shuttling greater than half, or $1.1 billion, to schooling tasks.
That features $170 million to proceed free college meals for college kids and $120 million to assist free group school. One other $600 million is slated for transportation tasks.
Home lawmakers accredited $1.1 billion for schooling and greater than $700 million for transportation, which may arrange some debate between the 2 chambers as soon as funds negotiators enter non-public talks later this summer time.
Senate Democrats additionally proposed eliminating renter-paid brokers’ charges, a proposal that has drawn assist from Gov. Maura Healey and the Home.
However Senate management backed language from Healey that shifts the burden of the charges to whoever enlists the providers of a dealer.
The Home prohibits tenant-paid brokers’ charges in most situations until a tenant initiated the contact, acquired a disclosure, and agreed to sure circumstances.
“We think our language accomplishes what we want it to accomplish, that there be no broker fees onto tenants,” Rodrigues stated of the Senate’s dealer charges proposal.
And just like the Home, Senate Democrats budgeted $275 million for the emergency help shelter system, a $50 million drop from Healey’s funds plan and the earlier fiscal yr.
Rodrigues stated declining caseloads and new restrictions imposed by the Healey administration and the Legislature led to lowered money for a system that has housed hundreds of native and migrant households.
“The EA system was always about more or less 50-50 between long-term residents of the commonwealth and newly arrived residents of the commonwealth. So we think that’s a number that makes sense at this time,” Rodrigues stated, including that he believes $275 million shall be sufficient to cowl all fiscal yr 2026 expenditures.
Supplies from the Related Press have been used on this report.
