BOSTON — The $144.4 million supplemental budget that bounced between the House and Senate on Wednesday afternoon landed on Gov. Charlie Baker’s desk by the end of the day, having been approved by both branches nearly unanimously.
The midyear spending bill included $30.2 million for the Committee for Public Counsel Services, $28 million for sheriffs departments, $20.9 million for emergency assistance shelters, $14 million for DOC facilities, $12.4 million for collective bargaining, $10.8 million for Department of Developmental Services’ Turning 22, $6 million for judgments and settlements, $5.2 million for the Department of Children and Families, $4.5 million for elder home care, and $300,000 for a new reserve to cover the cost to begin legal marijuana implementation, Senate budget chief Karen Spilka said.
The bill also doubles from $150,000 to $300,000 the one-time payment to families of first responders killed in the line of duty, a change that will take effect in time to benefit the family of Watertown firefighter Joseph Toscano, who died March 17 while on duty fighting a two-alarm fire.
The bill is a reworked version of a $259 million supplemental budget filed in February by Gov. Baker, and Spilka said that the version up for a vote Wednesday addresses “only the most pressing needs of the commonwealth while making sure we balance our fiscal responsibility and remain good stewards of taxpayer dollars.”
House Ways and Means Chairman Brian Dempsey said legislative leaders wanted to limit the size of the spending bill at this point in the year after February revenue collections put the state $134 million behind estimates for current year.
Senate Minority Leader Bruce Tarr questioned the lack of additional funding for snow and ice removal, and Spilka said that the snow and ice account had about a $14 million balance before last week’s storm. “Over the next few weeks, we will have a better sense of what that account needs,” she said, alluding to the fact that though tax revenues remain in a funk, lawmakers are not done spending this fiscal year. Spilka said she expects another supplemental budget to emerge for fiscal 2017, which ends on June 30.
The House passed the bill Wednesday by a 156-1 roll call vote with Rep. James Lyons the lone dissenter. The Senate passed the bill on a 22-0 standing vote.

