Ohio budget ends fiscal year with a balance in the black

By Mark Niquette

Columbus Dispatch

COLUMBUS

The state finished the 2010 fiscal year in the black, thanks largely to under-spending that included delaying the payment of a Medicaid bill, a monthly financial report released Monday shows.

But Gov. Ted Strickland’s administration isn’t saying specifically when it will provide guidance to state agencies for planning the next two-year state budget, which some analysts say could have a shortfall approaching $8 billion.

The state’s Office of Budget and Management released its June financial report recapping the fiscal year that ended June 30. It showed the state ended the year with a balance of $139.1 million.

Total state tax receipts came in $121.5 million less than projected. They were down $860.1 million from actual collections in fiscal 2009 and a whopping $3.19 billion less than in fiscal 2008, the report said.

But the state still maintained a balanced budget, in large part because it spent nearly $570 million less than expected, the report said. The largest chunk was $410 million in under-spending for Medicaid, the federal-state health care program for the poor.

Of that amount, $78.7 million was a Medicaid fee-for-service payment that the state made July 1, the start of the 2011 fiscal year, instead of June2 8. That shifted the expense into 2011, but it affected only the size of the 2010 ending balance, Strickland spokeswoman Amanda Wurst said.

“The budget would have been balanced with or without having made that payment,” Wurst said.

Still, that expense now must be managed in the current fiscal year. In addition, the expected 2010 carryover to be used in 2011 was nearly $53 million less than projected.

Other areas of under-spending included $27 million that had been budgeted but wasn’t needed to help agencies cover unemployment costs for laid-off workers, Wurst said.

According to state law, the administration must provide guidance to state agencies by Sept. 15 about planning for the next two-year budget, but the administration will say only that guidance will be given “soon.”