To assure accurate comparisons with the governor's recommendations versus the prior year's appropriation, MDN consistently has used for the prior year figure the actual appropriations approved by the governor (what was passed by the legislature without adjusting based on any gubernatorial line-item vetoes, withholdings or spending restrictions.).

The reason is to assure our tables compare "apples to apples", not "apples to oranges." What the legislature passes always is subject after the governor signs the bill to withholdings, now called "restrictions" by the administration.

In fact, in some years, governors signed bloated budgets when it was obvious there would need to be subsequent withholdings of spending authority.

For major building construction and improvement projects, the capital improvements budgets include figures for the number of years a project is expected to require.

Thus, a large portion of the capital improvements budget involves funds that are not expected to be spent in the next fiscal year. Instead, for future years, there are "reappropriation" bills to reappropriate the unspent funds for capitol improvement projects. Those reappropriation figures also are not included in the budget tables.

The problem with supplemental appropriations is that they are for the remaining months of the current fiscal year. There are no supplemental appropriations for the full fiscal year upon which the legislature is working.

One problem with our MDN approach involves the Medicaid budget. Often, the legislature underfunded Medicaid significantly lower that budget leaders knew was required. It made the "welfare" portion of the budget appear lower than would be required. Because Medicaid is an "entitlement" program, it has been necessary for the to approve a Medicaid supplemental appropriation in the next year's legislative session.

In 2020, budget leaders from both parties acknowledged there was no guarantee how much Missouri actually would get nor how that money could be spent.

In order to assure the state would not take advantage of every federal dollar it might get, the legislature passed a spending authorization for FY 2021 far higher than it ultimately got.

So some of the reducations in the "All Funds" category for FY 2022 compared to FY 2021 could be a reflection of the decision to authorize a far higher level of spending than various state agencies actually got.

Medicaid is another complication.

The governor's budget is based on a recommendation to fully fund voter-approved Medicaid expansion that would cost the state more than $100 million in return for more than $1.5 billion in additional federal Medicaid reimbursements.

But the legislature cut that item out of the budget with the committee chair proposing a budget bill reallocating the state funds for Medicaid expansion to other programs.

That is the major reason the Republican legislature approved a General Revenue Budget substantially smaller than the governor's recommendation to include required state matching funds for federal Medicaid expansion funds.