Sen. Mike Lang recounts 65th Montana legislature

The 65th Montana legislature ended in late April by balancing a $10.3 billion-dollar- budget for the biennium of 2018 and 2019. My first session was in 2013 and we had about $550 million of general fund cash on hand. However, because spending was not curtailed and the revenue projections did not materialize, at the end of May 2017 only $76M remains in the general fund cash balance. A year ago at this time we had a balance of $343M. The budget is based on revenue and expenditure estimations. If estimations deviate then you are not balanced. Basically, revenues are generated after the two tax cy...