Ohio Budget Director Expects $3 Billion Surplus Over The Next Two Years
The state budget process began during the pandemic, when schools and businesses were closed, unemployment numbers were at double digits, and terrifying predictions of death tolls were circulating. A year later, the state and Ohioans are flush with federal COVID relief money, so the budget picture has changed a lot.
Gov. Mike DeWine’s budget director Kim Murnieks said she expects the state to have a surplus of $1.7 billion by the end of the fiscal year on June 30, and a $1.6 billion surplus in June 2022.
That’s $3 billion more than the deficit the state had predicted.
Murnieks had said last June that a major shortfall could be looming, and last summer she was concerned the effects of the pandemic might last years. She had presented a budget that was more conservative than estimates legislators had received from their researchers, but said a few weeks later that it appeared the conditions had improved such that the state's rainy-day fund might not need to be used, which DeWine had indicated was a possibility but one he wanted to hold off on.
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