DALLAS - Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal on Monday promised to veto aspects of the fiscal 2010 budget passed by the Legislature last week so lawmakers can provide more money for higher education.
Jindal said he would veto any spending that depended on the Legislature passing several measures in the final two weeks of the regular session, including a delay in a scheduled reduction in the income tax rate, drawing on a dormant insurance incentive fund, and tapping into the state's budget stabilization fund.
"I don't want there to be any confusion," Jindal said at his regular Monday news conference. "We're going to veto any funding contingent on those three measures. We don't want to play games with the Legislature. We want to be clear about what we are doing."
The spending was added in the Senate to the HB 1 budget measure approved by the House in May.
The Senate proposals restored $118 million of the $218 million in cuts to higher education proposed by Jindal by delaying the tax reduction, took $86 million from the budget stabilization fund for agriculture and cultural programs, and drew from a dormant insurance incentive fund to provide $19.4 million for projects in each legislative district.
Jindal said he would veto any funding based on the three measures because all the spending was contingent upon all three measures being approved this session.
"We couldn't spend any of the money without spending all the money," he said. "If any of the three measures did not pass the Legislature with a two-thirds majority, none of the money could be spent."
The governor said he would support a plan to reduce his proposed 15% cut for higher education to 10% by adding at least $120 million to higher education spending. The money would be provided by a separate appropriations bill that took $70 million from the insurance fund and $50 million of the revenue expected to be generated through a tax-amnesty program.
House leadership urged members last week to concur with the Senate version despite their opposition to the increased spending, and send the $28.7 billion budget to Jindal in time for Legislature to override line-items vetoes before the regular session ends on June 25. The Legislature can call itself back into a special veto session, but that has not occurred since the current state constitution was adopted in 1974.
Senate President Joel Chaisson 2d, D-Destrehan, on Saturday tried to derail the House leadership's plan by invoking a rarely used procedural move and hold onto the budget bill for three days after its passage by the House on Thursday.
That would have allowed Jindal to withhold his veto until the session ended. However, the governor said Monday he wanted to exercise the veto quickly, rather than take 12 days to sign or veto legislation as provided by the state constitution.
"I wanted to do this early in the process, to give the Legislature two weeks to increase funding for higher education," he said. "Our top priority in the remainder of this session is to make sure additional funding is provided with another appropriations bill."
Jindal said he agreed to restore some of the funding for higher education after a meeting with his four predecessors on June 11. However, he warned that higher ed might be facing even more severe cuts in future years.
"It is important that we get a detailed plan from higher education on how they will use this time to reorganize," he said. "They have been given some extra time, and they need to use it."
Jindal said he received the budget bill on Sunday, and may veto other spending proposals after further review.
