Legislature OKs $40.2B budget; some of gov’s plans spurned

State lawmakers have sent Gov. Charlie Baker a reworked, $40.2 billion budget that rejected several of his sweeping proposals to Medicaid, sliced $400 million in original spending and levelfunded several state agencies amid lean fiscal times on Beacon Hill.

“This is the harshest state budget since the last recession,” bemoaned Senate President Stanley C. Rosenberg, who saw Senate proposals shot down that would have taxed short-term rentals such as Airbnb and tapped the horse racing fund for millions to balance needs elsewhere.

Lawmakers unveiled, and then passed, the 327-page spending plan within hours, plopping it on Baker’s desk a week into the new fiscal year. He’ll now have 10 days to sign it or veto all or parts of it.

Analysts had estimated that the state was facing up to a $1 billion spending gap this fiscal year, but the conference committee of House and Senate leaders ultimately lopped off $650 million, including the cuts, and another $205 million in so-called reversions, such as lower-thanprojected caseloads for social services.

The spending plan includes a proposal from Baker to increase the so-called Employer Medical Assistance Contribution in an effort to trim MassHealth spending and pull another $200 million into state coffers.

But lawmakers did not adopt a slew of other health care-focused proposals by Baker, who pitched them as a package deal.

Baker’s office said yesterday he’d review the plan, but did not hint at his plans.

The delayed spending plan also held up, at least temporarily, ongoing negotiations over a rewrite of the state’s marijuana law, which is also now a week past lawmakers’ self-imposed deadline.

They were scheduled to huddle again yesterday, but there was no word on a compromise. The budget lawmakers passed sets aside $2 million for regulating the weed industry, but it’s far below the $10 million Treasurer Deborah B. Goldberg said it’d likely take to get an oversight agency off the ground.