UPDATE: House adjourns; overtime likely

Updated 3:07 p.m.

The House of Delegates has adjourned until noon Saturday as negotiators from each chamber continue to seek a deal on the state budget.

House Majority Leader H. Morgan Griffith, R-Salem, said that while it remains possible, he does not consider it likely that lawmakers will approve a budget in time to adjourn on Saturday.


Earlier:

RICHMOND — Two days of legislative negotiations have produced modest advances toward a new state budget, but both sides say a shift in attitudes may be the most promising development.

A dozen lawmakers expected to toil late into Thursday evening hoping to shake hands on a deal by Friday. With a deal in place by noon, the General Assembly could still meet its Saturday adjournment deadline.

The legislature has to reconcile a budget through 2012 that’s more than $4 billion short of projected revenues, the sharpest and longest downturn for state finances in modern times.

After testy encounters between Senate and House negotiating teams earlier in the week, including pledges by both sides to stand firm until the fiscal year’s end in June to get their way, relations thawed Wednesday.

“The atmosphere has been more conciliatory (with) more desire to see each other’s priorities and get this game over,” said House Appropriations Committee Chairman Lacey Putney, an independent from Bedford and the lead House negotiator.

No matter the outcome, thousands of local and state government jobs are likely to be eliminated over the new budget’s two-year life, services are likely to be streamlined or cut, and some city and county governments will have to consider property tax increases.

House and Senate conferees and experts from the staffs of both chambers’ money committees broke into small working groups Wednesday night and Thursday to refine spending plans in major spending areas such as public safety and health and human resources.

The most towering obstacles, however, remained Thursday evening, with about 48 hours remaining in the scheduled life of the 2010 session. And any breakdown in the talks could send the session into overtime for the fifth time in 10 years.

Sen. Janet D. Howell, a conferee, agreed that the talks appeared to have turned a corner, but there are demands on which the Senate won’t relent, including restoring many House cuts to state support to local public schools.

“We’ve been in no rush. We’re still not in any rush,” said Howell, D-Fairfax County.

For the House’s Republican majority and Republican Gov. Bob McDonnell, the priority is limiting the amount of fee increases the Senate had sought to generate additional revenue, particularly new levies for filing lawsuits in Virginia courts.

“The bill as passed by the Senate is extraordinarily high and would put us at the most prohibitive court fees in the country,” McDonnell said in an AP interview. “But I think some reasonable increase at this point would be appropriate.”

The Senate has already reduced its court fee proposal by nearly one-fourth, from almost $51 million to nearly $39 million, but Putney said the take is still too high.

Posted in: Top Stories