The Senate Finance Committee Thursday killed a $12.8 million appropriation from the administration saying there is no money in the funding source. On another administration bill, the committee appropriated an additional $2.6 million because it said the administration had underestimated the revenues available.
The committee quickly dispensed with several budget bills Thursday. It is scheduled to meet at 9 a.m. Friday to take up more meaty items, including the Omnibus Act, the Territorial Court budget and a proposal to amend the law governing the Industrial Development Commission.
With the only minority member of the committee, Sen. Alicia "Chucky" Hansen, absent on Thursday, all actions were unanimous.
The committee voted down a transfer of $12.8 million from the Transportation Trust Fund to the General Fund. The administration was counting on it as part of its attempt to balance the budget. But Committee Chairman Lorraine Berry said that Campbell Malone, the legislative post auditor, reported the Transportation Trust Fund is actually $11.2 million "in the red."
Originally set up in 1989 with money from the General Fund and from road tax collections, the Transportation Trust Fund money was dedicated in a 1998 bond issue to pay government salary increases.
Even with the transfer, revenues in the 2001 budget were already $15 million shy of covering expenditures.
Budget Director Ira Mills declined to comment Thursday until he had reviewed the matter.
Saying that rum revenues will increase more than expected, the committee in other actions reconsidered a bill it had reported out last week, appropriating money from the Internal Revenue Matching Fund, and dipped into the fund for another $2.6 million.
The additional appropriations are:
– $1.5 million for paving roads on St. Croix;
– $1.5 million for paving roads on St. Thomas;
– $255,832 for paving roads on St. John;
– $80,000 for a bronze bust of the late band leader Emile "Milo" Francis at Educators Park;
– $54,000 for an appraisal and study of the purchase of Villa La Reine shopping center for use as a government complex;
– $25,000 to Tourism for a feasibility study on the Virgin Islands hosting spring break 2002.
The committee also reconsidered an appropriation from the Caribbean Basin Initiative Fund to the General Fund to cut it from $847,139 to $450,000, on Malone's advice that that is all the money available.
The committee reinstated a bill it had tabled last week. The proposal requires commercial sewage disposal businesses to pay for the use of public waste water systems for the disposal of sewage.
The senators held several appropriation measures awaiting a clarification of the figures.
They approved:
– $454,208 from the Government Insurance Fund for operating expenses of the Finance Department;
– $2.9 million from the Indirect Cost Fund for salaries and operating expenses of Finance, Property and Procurement and the Office of Management and Budget;
– $400,000 for the Public Employees Relations Board and $90,000 for the Labor Management Committee;
– $300,000 from the Industrial Development Fund to the General Fund;
– $2 million from the Interest Revenue Fund to the General Fund.
Besides Berry, members of the committee present were: Sens. Gregory Bennerson, Anne Golden, Roosevelt David, George Goodwin and David Jones.
