New York State lawmakers approved a capital budget with a 34% increase in bond issuance in the coming year.
Gov. Andrew Cuomo and legislative leaders announced the budget's passage Tuesday, a day before the April 1 commencement of the new fiscal year.
After selling $4.2 billion in bonds in the just-completed fiscal year 2014, New York expects to sell $5.6 billion in the current fiscal year, according to the executive's FY2015 Capital Program and Financing Plan.
Of the $5.6 billion, $306 million is expected to come from general obligation bonds and $5.160 billion is expected to come from bonds sold through the state's authorities. If everything goes as planned, the state will roll the remaining $150 million over to fiscal 2016.
The state expects its total capital spending to be $8.527 billion, up from the $7.991 billion of fiscal 2014. The difference between the bonds sold and the total capital spending is accounted by federal and state pay-as-you-go spending.
The state's authorities are expected to account for $11.9 billion in capital spending outside of the state capital budget this fiscal year.
The budget calls for $2 billion in general obligation bonds to be brought to voters in November for education. Proceeds would be used to introduce technology in schools and to build space for pre-kindergarten programs.
The budget also calls for a $1.2 billion health care initiative to build a variety of facilities for hospitals, primary care centers, nursing homes, behavioral/substance abuse centers and the like. Money will go to public and non-profit institutions in New York, where there are no for-profit hospitals.
Some of the capital spending will be used for economic development purposes.
Some of the capital spending and bond figures may diverge somewhat from the numbers in the executive budget because the legislature may have made some minor changes to the capital budget in recent days, a source close to the governor said.
Even after the legislative approvals on March 31, the governor's Division of Budget has to track how the state's finances ended the fiscal year before creating an enacted budget financial plan (for operating budget) and an enacted budget capital plan (for capital budget) within 30 days. Only then will the state have an official budget for the fiscal year.
The state government also approved a $137.9 billion operating budget on March 31.
The budget "maintains our fiscal discipline by holding spending growth below two percent, while also cutting up to $1.5 billion in property taxes to help homeowners and address the unsustainable proliferation of local governments," Cuomo said.
