Under the Dome: Anticipation of the Economic Forecast
With a Continued Push to Replenish the Unemployment Insurance Trust Fund
March 12, 2022
The Joint Budget Committee Long Bill and Economic Forecast Anticipation
As the state anxiously awaits the JBC Economic Forecast, the Joint Budget Committee will be finalizing the long bill and budget through the end of March, and the Economic Forecast will be presented to the Committee on March 17. The March economic forecast presents the final numbers to which the joint budget committee budgets its annual state budget bill, aka “The Long Bill” With the Ukrainian crisis compounding and exacerbating inflationary pressures that have been evident for some time, there is high interest in how the state economist will project state revenues in the coming year and in the 3 year forecast horizon.
Should you have an interest in the preparation of Colorado’s state budget, Legislative Council provides , tools to explore aspects of the state budget.
With the budget looming, a series of legislative measures are pending that have appropriation requests attached and await action by the respective body’s Appropriations Committee. The Fiscal Notes report, released this week, contains several reports showing the fiscal impacts of all legislation currently pending before the General Assembly or that has been enacted into law at the 2022 legislative session. Data is available on expenditures, revenue, TABOR refunds, and fund transfers, as well as the net General Fund budget impact of legislation. Of all the bills introduced this session so far, there will be almost $58mm in expenditures, have nearly a ($362mm) net budget impact, a TABOR Refund of ($219mm) with a net result of ($142mm). The Operating Budget for the various 21 state agencies can be reviewed on the Colorado Operating Budget Report. For FY 21-22, that total operating budget of $36.5B. This includes Includes total appropriations and General Fund-only appropriations for each state agency.
