Gov. Jennifer Granholm and the state Senate and House of Representatives have come to an agreement on the state's fiscal year budget for 2007, but now they have to iron out its details.
Granholm, speaker of the House Craig DeRoche, R-Novi, and Senate Majority Leader Ken Sikkema, R-Wyoming, released the budget June 30. The budget must be finalized by the beginning of the fiscal year, which starts Oct. 1.
The new budget is the product of discussions and compromise between the three bodies, said Greg Bird, spokesman for the state budget office.
"Everyone came together at the same table and worked with the best interest of the state in mind," Bird said. "I think a very good product came out as a result of that."
Granholm released her budget in February, while the House and Senate passed their budgets in May.
Among the parts of the new budget is an average of a 3 percent increase in funding to colleges and universities in the state.
MSU would receive a 3 percent increase for operations, while the Michigan Agricultural Experiment Station and the Cooperative Extension Services would each receive a 2 percent increase.
MSU would receive about $292 million in funding for next year.
Funding for higher education was a priority for the Senate, Sikkema's spokesman Ari Adler said.
"We pushed for increases in funding for higher education and to make sure there was a floor for higher education funding," Adler said.
State colleges and universities would get different funding based on several factors, including how they have historically been funded, Adler said. Those increases range from 2-1/2 to 3 percent. The funding for higher education is a change from Granholm's proposal, which would have given MSU, Wayne State University and the University of Michigan — the state's three research colleges — a 2 percent increase. The rest of the colleges and universities would have received their funding from the $2 billion for higher education funding Granholm proposed.
Other elements of the new budget include funding for a new school for the Michigan State Police and a $210 increase in per-pupil funding for K-12 schools.
DeRoche spokesman Matt Resch said the budget agreement allowed Michigan to keep spending below the rate of inflation while still funding education and other programs.
"It sends the signal that in a time when officials in Washington, D.C. continue to spend and spend, we can make some common sense spending decisions," Resch said.
Conference committees, made up of members of the House and Senate, will pass parts of the overall budget in the coming weeks.
All three bodies hope to have the budget process completed by the end of July.
