Legislative
Judicial
Governmental operations
Human services - DSHS
Human services - other
Natural resources & recreation
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Kindergarten through grade 12 education
Higher education
Other education
State employee compensation
Bond retirement & interest
Special appropriations to the Governor
Retirement systems contributions
Expenditures

Agency recommendation summaries

The individual agency Recommendation Summaries in this document reflect the dollar and FTE differences between current biennium (2009-11) expenditure authority and the Governor's proposed 2011-13 budget. The summaries also identify the activities the agencies perform, with narrative that is intended to present a succinct, informative description of the services that result from this budget proposal.

Due to its timing, changes made to agency appropriations in House Bill 3225 (December 11, 2010) are not reflected in the 2009-11 biennium numbers included in this document. Also, under Governor’s proposed legislation, cigarette tax revenue now going to the Education Legacy Trust Account would move to the General Fund-State starting in Fiscal Year 2011. A like amount of Education Legacy Trust Account expenditures are moved to General Fund support. This re-direction impacts the comparability of expenditures between biennia for education agencies.

The activity information continues to play a crucial role in the Governor’s budget development effort, helping decision makers analyze statewide costs and results, and providing a meaningful way to talk about the work of state government. While activity data appears to be the best way to explain what the budget will buy, there are also some qualifications that should be noted:

Most agencies do not have accounting systems that detail expenditures to the activity level. Costs displayed in the Recommendation Summaries should be considered reasonable, but not precise, estimates.
With approximately 1,000 activity descriptions for more than 100 agencies, the level at which activities are defined will vary somewhat from agency to agency.
The assignment of costs or savings of new items to activities is an estimate. The agency will have the opportunity to reassign these costs to the proper activities after the budget is enacted.

Other formatting conventions in this document include the following:

Each agency step table displays a summary line representing the cost of Maintenance Level (i.e., the dollars necessary to carry on the same activities next biennium, as adjusted for rate changes and mandatory caseload or enrollment changes). Proposed changes to this base level of funding are itemized as “Performance Changes” and briefly described.
An asterisk (*) indicates expenditure changes that are dependent on new revenue legislation.
Expenditures requiring other types of legislation are identified by a pound sign (#) at the end of the item label.

The statewide adjustments described below appear in numerous agency budgets.

Suspend Plan 1 Uniform COLA: This item reflects savings from ending future automatic benefit increases in the Public Employees’ Retirement System Plan 1 and the Teachers’ Retirement System Plan 1. Increases to the minimum benefit amount in the plans are not affected.
State Data Center Rate Increase: Funds are provided for the cost to design, acquire and install infrastructure (cabling, cabinets, and fiber connectivity) for the new State Data Center. These funds also pay for setting up existing data center infrastructure (network, storage, security, servers, mainframe and tape backup, and telephone equipment) in the new location. This new allocation is distributed based on the number of virtual server instances for each agency.

Printable Recommendation Summaries (Entire Document)