Gov. Katie Hobbs is rejecting a request from the speaker of the Arizona House for an interim budget to give his chamber a chance to negotiate a different spending plan. It’s a move that has never been done in the state’s history.
The current state budget ends in only a week, and a new one must be adopted by July first.
Hobbs and the Senate have already approved a bipartisan spending plan for the next fiscal year. But House Speaker Steve Montenegro says the proposal is unlikely to get the 31 necessary votes to pass his chamber.
House Republicans approved their own spending plan, which included measures unrelated to the budget, like putting restrictions on the attorney general to pursue criminal charges in certain election cases.
Hobbs rejected Montenegro’s request for an interim budget, which would continue current spending levels until a new plan was approved.
The current state budget self-destructs on July 1. And, except for certain core functions like prisons, without a new budget there is no authorization to keep other state operations running or pay other state expenses like aid to public schools.
Montenegro's solution is something that apparently has never been done in Arizona: adopt an interim budget that continues the current level of state spending — and that authorization to pay bills — beyond June 30, providing more time for talks.
No way, said Hobbs.
"I remain committed to having conversations about improving our bipartisan budget," the governor said in a prepared statement this weekend, meaning tweaks in that $17.6 billion plan. "But let me be clear: Any kind of partisan 'continuation budget' will immediately meet my veto pen, even if it has the votes to reach my desk."
