How does the work of the Budget Committee differ from Appropriations or Ways and Means?
The Budget Committee is the architect, Appropriations and Ways and Means are the carpenters and plumbers and the electricians. That’s a way to think about it from a metaphorical standpoint. The Budget Committee writes the budget and then gives the instructions to those committees to actually write the legislation to meet the budget targets. So, for instance, the Budget Committee writes the budget and says, ‘Here’s how much money we’re going to spend on discretionary spending.’ It gives that number to the Appropriations Committee, and then they fill it up. I’ll give them one number, which is for all discretionary spending, and then they break it down into the programmatic level. For Ways and Means (of which Ryan is also a member), we give them whatever instructions we give them as savings targets on money to save from areas in their jurisdiction. … Every committee that touches a taxpayer dollar will get an instruction from the Budget Committee on what their savings targets have to be
Related Questions
- Will the Senate Ways & Means Committee’s proposed supplemental budget for the current biennium (SB 5403) eliminate only 10 staff positions (FTEs) from the State Library?
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