"The problem will be when we start plugging everything else into the budget," Hillyard said. "You may have some Republicans who are not ready to commit this much money this early."

Originally, both Senate and House leaders planned to approve a bill with base budgets from each committee, increased education funding and salary increases. The base budgets were supposed to use last year's funding numbers without any new funding, in order to avoid controversy.

The $70 million came about because the Transportation, Environmental Quality and National Guard Appropriations Subcommittee tacked on $95 million in new funding to its budget. Obviously irked by the tactic — Hillyard told the subcommittee co-chairmen they "were not following the script" — Executive Appropriations initially rejected the whole budget and simply approved last year's budget. They later reversed themselves, however, by appropriating the $70 million instead of $95 million.

The other eight subcommittees, who all played by the rules, had their base budgets approved as part of the bill. All told, the bill will for approximately $8.3 million of the 8.6 million budget.

---

E-mail: jloftin@desnews.com