The House is working on the next Fiscal Year (FY) 2024 budget, which covers state government and its community partner organizations from July 1, 2023 to June 30, 2024. The committee expects to present its proposed budget to the full House for discussion later in March. We are seeing substantial revenue growth this year, largely due to the impact of federal pandemic stimulus and recovery dollars. Our challenge is to make strategic use of one-time funds to meet state priorities.
Those priorities include leveraging federal funds to support improvements in roads, bridges and other infrastructure needs under Congress’ Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (passed last year). Other targeted statewide priorities are those that will deliver long-term dividends for Vermonters including investments in housing, broadband expansion, workforce training, clean energy and childcare. As is our Vermont tradition, it will be a balanced budget, even though Vermont does not have a statutory requirement to do so.