January 19, 2009: Legislative Report #8

$7,000,000,000.00 Budget Shortfall

Back on December 5th 2008 the Minnesota Department of Finance presented their budget forecast debt of $5.2 billion to the Ways and Means Committee. Refer to our Legislative Report #1. After the meeting, I met with Chair Loren Solberg (DFL 03) for a couple minutes in his office. I shared with Loren my concern and expectation the budget debt forecast in February would balloon to 7 or 8 billion dollars. Loren graciously disagreed and stated any increase in the forecast would only be a few hundred million dollars.

On Thursday, January 15th 2009, K-12 Finance Committee held a meeting in room 10 state office building. Mindy Greiling (DFL 54-A) chaired the meeting. Minnesota State Economist Tom Stinson gave testimony during a portion of the meeting.

During the discussions, the February 2009 budget forecast became part of the conversation. Mindy mentioned that the previous day she had a private conversation with Mr. Stinson about the expected forecast results. Mr. Stinson had given Mindy a grave assessment that the budget debt forecast is expected to balloon to $7,000,000,000.00. Mr. Stinson agreed to Mindy's statement.