Gov. Janet Mills (D) announced Friday her plans to allocate millions in taxpayers’ dollars to a series of one-time initiatives in Fiscal Years (FY) 2024 and 2025.
This new funding comes in addition to the governor’s proposed supplemental budget that is currently being debated by lawmakers.
In a press release distributed before the Easter weekend, Gov. Mills’ highlighted a number of projects that she hopes to see receive funding in the forthcoming budget, including additional support for affordable housing construction in rural Maine, grants to child care providers, low or no-interest loans to groups of mobile home park residents seeking to purchase their development, and increased financial backing for the effort to establish a Kennebec County Crisis Center.
Not highlighted in the governor’s press release but also included in the proposed change package are recommendations to earmark $3 million to cover the first responder overtime costs associated with last October’s mass shooting in Lewiston and to increase the cap for the state’s Disaster Recovery Fund from $3 million to $30 million.
The governor goes on to propose that the full $30 million be transferred to the Disaster Recovery Fund by June 30, 2025 in order to “fund the State’s share of estimated disaster recovery costs.”
Mills also seeks to authorize Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) to grant a permit for the construction of an offshore wind terminal on the Sears Island jetty dune in Searsport.
According to the definition provided in the proposed language, this area consists of “approximately four tenths of an acre” and is “located south of and abutting the jetty on the western side of the island on the parcel of land reserved for port development.”
[RELATED: Mills Designates the Pristine Sears Island to be Developed For Offshore Wind]
One of the proposals highlighted by Mills in her press release Friday is the reservation of $22 million in funding for affordable housing construction and the provision of low-income housing tax credits.
$11 million of this amount is set to go toward the Rural Affordable Rental Housing Program, with the other $11 million being leveraged by the state to gain an additional $11 million worth of Federal low-income housing tax credits.
Mills estimated that this will lead to the construction of 150 new housing units across the state, meaning she envisions taxpayers funding $133,000 for every unit of housing constructed under the plan.
Although the bill does not articulate a timeline for the completion of those projects, the funding will be distributed to the Maine Housing Authority “on or before June 30, 2025,” and if it is not spent down by June 30, 2026, it will revert to the General Fund’s unappropriated surplus.
[RELATED: Maine State Housing Authority to Construct 105 New Affordable Housing Units in Rural Maine]
Another $5 million is set to be transferred to the Maine State Housing Authority for the establishment of a “housing preservation fund” that will be used to “support the purchase of mobile home parks by their residents” by providing “low or no-interest financing to entities, such as resident cooperatives” seeking to purchase their mobile home parks.
The governor also has proposed allocating $11.8 million for “one-time grants to child care providers to support their stability while the expanded Child Care Affordability Program is implemented.”
These grants could be used for a variety of purposes, including for staff recruitment and retention stipends, “tuition scholarships” for the children of child care staff, and “health and safety improvements ” to facilities.
Another major portions of the funding proposed by Mills — $23.2 million — would go toward the establishment of a Nursing Facility Reform Transition Fund that would support facilities as “MaineCare implements comprehensive rate reform” in the coming years.
A proposed $5.5 million would go toward funding the “state share of unexpected additional and one-time pharmacy costs due to the cybersecurity attack on United Health’s Change Healthcare.”
Mills’ spending omnibus also seeks to allocate an additional $550,000 to the start-up funding for the Kennebec County Crisis Center while simultaneously reworking some of the requirements for the forthcoming facility.
Specifically, Mills proposed mandating the provision of “mental health and crisis stabilization services” and making it optional for the center to have at least 10 beds reserved for “medically managed withdrawal services.”
She has also recommended requiring that the center’s services be offered to individuals regardless of insurance and specifying that the center must provide “low-barrier walk-in access to behavioral health services.”
Click Here to Read the Full Text of the Governor’s Proposed Budget Change Package
According to the press release published by the governor’s office on Friday, this budget change package was crafted after the Revenue Forecasting Committee identified roughly $108 million worth of one-time funding available for FY 2024 and 2025.
The governor’s office explained in Friday’s statement that this increase is “primary driven by strong corporate tax revenues, which can be volatile and should not be relied upon for a long-term budgeting outlook like individual income or sales tax revenues.”
For this reason, the funding proposals contained in the budget change package are all one-time investments and do not seek to establish sources of ongoing funding for the various proposed initiatives.
“This fiscally responsible proposal aims to address some of the most urgent challenges Maine people are facing, like access to affordable housing, child care, and long-term care,” said Mills said in a statement Friday. “And it aims to tackle these critically important items in a financially sustainable way, ensuring that, when taken with my previous proposal to save money, the State of Maine can meet its ongoing commitments in the next biennium.”
“This proposal advances the Administration’s approach of investing in Maine’s most critical needs in a fiscally responsible way,” said Kirsten Figueroa, Commissioner for the Department of Administrative and Financial Services. “As revenues remain largely level, this proposal will help Maine people while ensuring the state’s long-term fiscal standing so that we can meet our obligations in the future.”
As of Friday evening, neither the Democrat nor Republican caucuses in Augusta had issued formal statements in response to the bill.
The Maine Policy Institute (MPI) — of which the Maine Wire is a project — spoke out against the governor’s proposal for failing to return surplus revenues to taxpayers in the form of reduced tax rates.
MPI also pointed up the new tax increase on digital streaming services, the second major tax increase Mills has backed during the 131st Legislature.
[RELATED: Streaming Service Subscriptions May Soon Be Taxed in Maine]
“While the governor attempts to label her supplemental budget as fiscal restraint and responsibility, Mainers deserve to know her recommendations are anything but,” said MPI CEO Matt Gagnon. “Despite many consecutive surpluses, the governor’s plan provides no tax relief for Maine families and actually increases their tax burden through the creation of a digital streaming tax.”
Gagnon also called out a separate forthcoming move from Mills and Democratic allies in the legislature to use Maine’s Budget Stabilization Fund in a manner that is inconsistent with its statutory purpose.
The Budget Stabilization Fund (BSF) — sometimes referred to colloquially as the “Rainy Day Fund” — is statutorily required to be used only in cases where actual state revenues decline unexpectedly or to provide assistance to the families of fallen first responders.
In her State of the State address, the governor proposed averting these limitations and using money from the BSF to fund projects aimed at addressing climate-related issues.
“Considering the change package allocates an additional $15 million to help businesses and communities grappling with recent storm damage, legislative Democrats must now answer whether they still intend to raid Maine’s Budget Stabilization Fund as the governor has proposed via LD 2225,” said Gagnon.
“If Governor Mills was serious about fiscal restraint and responsibility, she would be returning this excess revenue to the people of Maine,” Gagnon said. “Instead, she is piling on more short-sighted, unnecessary spending while simultaneously raiding the state’s savings account and increasing taxes on hardworking Mainers.”
Click Here to Read the Governor’s Full Press Release
Lawmakers will now consider the governor’s budget change package alongside the rest of her proposed supplemental budget.
<span class="dsq-postid" data-dsqidentifier="27032 https://www.themainewire.com/?p=27032">22 Comments
No thought to saving this money or reducing the taxpayer’s burden; just spend, spend, spend!
Buying votes for demorats with working folks’ tax dollars. Typical.
Comrade Mills has been feeding at the public trough her whole career. Why would she and her miserable Commie pals have any concept of how hard-earned taxpayer dollars are actually created in the private sector?
It is only a surplus because we are over taxed. Good to see she cares about Maine taxpayers.
Overspending is like a narcotic to liberals.
If anyone thinks that the 22 million isn’t for free immigrant housing you haven’t been paying attention.
Stop letting all asylum seekers in!! Take care of our Vets & Homeless FIRST!!!
There is around one BILLION dollars in the “rainy day fund”, time for at least 1/2 of that be returned to tax payers! Not your free loaders, but actual tax paying citizens!
So General Mills and the leftist Legislature overtax us and have a huge surplus and instead of sending it all back and/or cutting taxes they spend every penny then send out deceitful emails to all of us claiming the Republicans want to cut taxes but have no way to “pay” for it.
Lying liars lying and spending our money like it’s water.
She had better not be spending this on ‘New Mainers’ (Illegals)! What about supporting the REAL MAINERS who need help, vets, homeless, aging… Give some thought to where these funds should be going. Buy votes will not help her!
„Isn’t she beautiful, isn’t she lovely „🤮
Next time at least vote for something more pleasant to look at.
So if we have a surplus, why are the democrats pushing to tax streaming services? And I am sure we will see more fees ( taxes) headed our way
No surprises here. This is what dems like her do. It’s part and parcel of who they are. They love spending money as long as it is someone else’s.
The money is burning a hole in Mills’ pocket.
Fiscal responsibility by the Mills administration? Even though they talk of these two words, it’s anathema to her money spending proclivities.
No extra money to check on the grow houses in Maine and the money?No though on refunding the $ to tax payers.
The only reason for a surplus is that the citizens and businesses were over taxed. The money should be refunded to the taxpayers not squandered on more dopey, useless big government programs.
“a series of one-time initiatives in Fiscal Years (FY) 2024 and 2025”. As usual our Governess is lying. What she means is that these are “First-Time initiatives”. Once the framework is set up to spend the money the first time, in subsequent years we tax payers will be told to “look at the good this is doing!! We have to make this program permanent”. I may not be bright, but I am not as stupid as our Governess would like me to be.
I think our “governor ” changed her last name to biden! Screw the maine people, why would they want to give US back some of OUR MONEY! I think a state wide tax revolt is in order. Or we just let the progressive Marxists pay and take in all the illegals.
SPEND! SPEND! SPEND!
She needs to be impeached from office. We are over taxed!!!! She will burn in Hell when it comes her time making poor people even Poorer!!!!