by Logan Finney, Idaho Reports

The lawmakers crafting Idaho’s state budget will use a new process on a revamped schedule this year, with goals of increased transparency and a faster timeline for the legislative session that began this week, though the changes prompted concern from some of their colleagues.

Previously, the Joint Finance-Appropriations Committee would typically hear back-to-back presentations from agency heads for the first several weeks of session, followed by setting all of the budgets in succession. In 2024, lawmakers will instead rely on presentations from legislative analysts, and they intend to write budgets on a rolling basis about two weeks after the presentations.

“We’re hoping that will also expedite the whole process here in the legislature,” said JFAC co-chair Sen. C. Scott Grow, R-Eagle. “When you are hearing approximately a hundred budgets in a two-week timeframe, and it seems like that’s all you’re hearing at the end [of session], that can get monotonous and repetitive for our fellow legislators.”

The shortened presentations are intended to give budget writers more working hours at the statehouse.

“This is a process we have stolen from the state of Utah and it seems to work well down there, and really does increase the visibility and transparency of spending in agencies,” said co-chair Rep. Wendy Horman, R-Idaho Falls.

The joint committee also will not advance budget bills if they do not earn majority support from members of both the House Appropriations and Senate Finance committees, a change adopted last year.

“Sometimes budgets will fail on the floor. That’s still a possibility of happening,” Horman said. “By getting them to our colleagues on the House and Senate floors sooner, we hope to experience less of that.”

The other major process change will include ten “maintenance budget” bills which the co-chairs described as funding only the bare basics of state government, such as benefits for state employees.

“The point is to get these budgets out to the floor much sooner so that our colleagues are considering them in the context of germane policy bills that are moving,” Horman said.

Lawmakers also hope that the new procedures will allow them to examine the base budgets of each state agency in greater detail, rather than just the proposed increases for a given budget year.

“When I sat for the first time in my first session last year going through the budgeting process, I realized and knew it was something like 80% we’re not looking at,” Sen. Scott Herndon, R-Sagle, told Idaho Reports on Tuesday. “Everything that came before, there’s an assumption that it’s all fine.”

Some lawmakers are concerned that JFAC no longer hearing directly from agency heads will mean less transparency in how state government plans to spend taxpayer dollars.

“I think there’s an incredible amount of value to have our department and agency heads speak to us. It gives us an opportunity to hold them accountable to the budget,” Rep. Brooke Green, D-Boise, told Idaho Reports. “That removal is concerning, because I do appreciate hearing from those who are in charge.”

While the agency directors will no longer present directly to lawmakers in a public forum, that does not preclude lawmakers from interacting with them and closely examining their budget requests.

“I think they reach out to us and make themselves pretty available,” Herndon said. “I think that’s fine because we’re going to reach out to them anyway. The analysts only know so much information – they only got so much from the agency when they put together the budget. And we usually are pretty inquisitive and want to know more anyway.”

The shortened budget presentations will also allow small working groups that assemble each budget to meet simultaneously, unlike prior years when JFAC members and staff often worked late into the night.

“I think it will make us more efficient. I think it will be a good thing,” Rep. Tina Lambert, R-Caldwell, told Idaho Reports.

Sen. Janie Ward-Engelking, D-Boise, told reporters Monday after the State of the State Address that the simultaneous working group meetings may make it harder for lawmakers to contribute to individual budgets that interest them if they were not specifically assigned to them.

“We’ve always, as JFAC members, been able to work any budget we want. And now, we’re being assigned budgets. Now, technically we can work the other budgets,” Ward-Engelking said, but “we’re assigned to a budget group that works at the same time, so that minimalizes our ability to work on other budgets that weren’t assigned to us.”

Green expressed the same concern to Idaho Reports on Tuesday.

“It’s too early for me to say I hate it, but too soon for me to say I like it,” Green said.

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