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By Sam Larson
Vice President, Government Affairs
The Massachusetts Senate last week unanimously approved a $58 billion budget for the Fiscal Year 2025 that begins July 1. A conference committee will now meet to iron out differences between the Senate spending blueprint and one passed earlier in the year by the House of Representatives.
Free community college for all and free rides on regional transit authorities are the key spending priorities in the Senate budget. Neither appear in the final House version of the budget.
Senators approved their budget after adding $89.6 million in spending to the proposal provided by the Ways and Means Committee. The chamber approved more than 400 amendments during the budget debate. AIM helped to defeat three anti-competitive tax amendments:
The conference committee will bring together three leaders from the House and three from the Senate to resolve a some significant differences between the two versions of the budget.
The differences in the House and Senate proposals include:
The Legislature will ultimately pass a compromise version of the budget and send that to Governor Maura Healey, who must sign it by July 1, 2024.
“The Fiscal Year 2025 budget overwhelmingly passed by the Senate makes transformative investments in education, regional equity, and builds upon the Commonwealth’s workforce economy,” said Senator Michael J. Rodrigues (D-Westport), Chair of the Senate Committee on Ways and Means. “These historic measures enable residents to remain in the state, solidifying our economic future for generations to come.”
Read AIM’s Full Analysis of the Senate’s Fiscal Year 2025 Budget Proposal.
