Senate OKs $3B in hurricane-related money
AUSTIN — Nineteen months after Hurricane Harvey devastated Texas, the Legislature took a major step Wednesday toward paying some of the bills related to the storm.
The Texas Senate approved a budget amendment that covers about $6 billion in unexpected state expenses since the last time the Legislature met.
About $3 billion is due to Hurricane Harvey, with about $900 million needed just to shore up school districts that still haven’t recovered from the lost property tax revenue after people were forced to flee their homes.
“Now I know those are big numbers,” said Sen. Jane Nelson, a North Texas Republican who chairs the Senate Finance Committee. “But $3 billion of this package is due to Harvey, which we knew was going to have a significant price tag.”
Another $2 billion is aimed at addressing a shortfall in Medicaid and $542 million is needed to address pension liabilities for the Teacher Retirement System.
Just over $4 billion of the money the Senate proposes spending is from the state’s Economic Stabilization Fund, known as the rainy day fund.
Senators defended having to tap the money after criticism on social media from conservative groups that say they’re spending too much in the supplemental bill.
State Sen. Larry Taylor, RFriendswood, said this is exactly why the state’s rainy day fund exists. He said that with events like Harvey and the shooting at Santa Fe, the fund is proving why it has been necessary to build up over the years.
“If we are not going to use the rainy day fund for something like that, I don’t know when you will ever use it,” Taylor said.
The Texas Senate passed the budget amendment 31-0, despite criticism from some conservative political groups like Empower Texans.
That group’s leader, Michael Quinn Sullivan, took to social media to accuse the Senate of going on a “spending spree.”
That brought a reaction from senators.
“I’m hearing outside people say we’re spending too much money,” Taylor said. “This is a very responsible budget from what I’m looking at,” he said.
The University of Houston, the Lone Star College System and Texas A&M are other big recipients of Harvey-related funding in the supplemental budget bill.
It calls for $20 million for the University of Houston, $4 million directly for the school’s downtown campus, $1.7 million for the Victoria campus and just over $83,000 for the Clear Lake campus. Lone Star College is set to receive $13 million for Harvey expense.
Another $2.5 million is going to the Texas A&M Forest Service for Harvey-related expenses.
The measure still must go to the House.