By Jakob Thorington | Arizona Capitol Times
Key Points:
- State budget analysts warns of increasing costs and insufficient funds
- New federal Medicaid requirements and tax law changes will impact state budget significantly
- Budget analysts project the state needs more than $1 billion to conform to federal policy
Budget analysts on a legislative Finance Advisory Committee gave a bleak budget outlook for the next legislative session, projecting the state only has $67 million to spend in 2027.
Joint Legislative Budget Committee analysts use the lowest ending balance to project how much money is available for discretionary purposes. The lowest ending balance for fiscal year 2028, which starts on July 1, 2027, is $67 million.
That $67 million is not enough to cover $580 million worth of one-time projects from this year’s budget, which includes school facility repairs and state employee health insurance subsidies. It’s also insufficient to cover the $1.1 billion that analysts expect will be needed to conform to the Trump administration’s “One Big Beautiful Bill,” known as H.R. 1.
