The 2009 supplemental budget to close the state’s deficit sped through the Senate Finance Committee, headed by Sen. Daniel DaPonte, and was passed by the full Senate on the same day. Providence Journal photo / Connie Grosch

PROVIDENCE –– The Senate overwhelmingly approved a $7.2-billion budget-repair bill Thursday that leans heavily on federal stimulus money to erase a massive current-year deficit, prompting weary legislative leaders to condemn the tax-and-spend plan even as they voted to send it to the governor’s desk.

“This right here, today, doesn’t represent the hard choices that we’re going to have to make as a state,” Majority Leader Daniel Connors said, moments before the chamber voted 32-6 to endorse a “supplemental budget” that partially restores unpopular cuts in aid to cities and towns, temporarily abandons plans to hike Rhode Island’s gas tax and delays pension reform.

Democratic leaders acknowledged that the package — approved a day after the House passed it — does little more than balance the state government’s budget on paper. With the certainty that the state’s finances are rapidly deteriorating, they had pushed for more dramatic cuts but backed off amid fierce opposition from rank-and-file House Democrats earlier in the week.

“While it may be nice and it may give people some satisfaction that these restorations are made, the fact is that it only puts off the problem for another 60 days,” Senate Finance Committee Chairman Daniel DaPonte said. “And so no one can say later on that they didn’t know or that they weren’t aware, whether it’s hospitals or nursing homes or cities and towns, I will state for the record, that [next year’s] budget will be much more difficult.”

Specifically, the General Assembly’s plan to address a $357-million current-year shortfall uses $205 million from the federal stimulus package, while hiking the tax on cigarettes by $1 a pack, selling state property, boosting reinstatement fees for suspended driver’s licenses, and slicing millions of dollars from Rhode Island’s hospitals and nursing homes.

Governor Carcieri has until midnight Tuesday to veto the plan.

Should the governor take that route — he refused to reveal his intentions — it would be largely symbolic. With just 10 Republicans in Rhode Island’s 113-member legislature, Democrats could easily override the Republican governor’s veto.

“He still has some concerns about the budget,” Carcieri spokeswoman Amy Kempe said. “Most notably, the budget restores some aid to local communities, but fails to address the underlying issue of unfunded mandates … In addition, by not passing pension reform, the General Assembly is not taking up one of the most important issues facing the state.”

Democratic leaders yesterday promised to change the state’s public pension system before the end of June. They also left the door open to raising the gasoline tax, a proposal they introduced last Friday, but abandoned Wednesday.

“The gas tax is another issue that’s not completely gone,” DaPonte said. “It will be part of the discussion as part of [next year’s] budget.”

The reliance on federal stimulus dollars, meanwhile, put some top lawmakers in the awkward position of having to defend a strategy they blasted when it was first proposed by the governor.

House Finance Committee Chairman Steven M. Costantino, who watched Thursday’s hour-long Senate debate from the public gallery, was among the initial critics.

But he said he had little choice in light of a rebellion among House Democrats who forced the restoration of $25 million of the $55 million in local revenue-sharing money that had been headed for the chopping block. Lawmakers also restored $3 million of a proposed $12-million cut to nursing homes.

To pay for the changes, the legislature took $20 million in additional stimulus funding that the governor had planned to use in the next two budget years. They also raided a hoped-for $4-million surplus and doubled unspecified personnel savings that now total $7.4 million.

“It was an issue that without making restorations in municipal aid, the House apparently was not going to be able to pass a budget,” DaPonte said. “As you all know, a budget and many other bills are arts of compromise.”

The Assembly leadership refused to use any of the state’s $105-million rainy-day fund, its cash reserve, as had been suggested by the governor. Their reluctance lay in the certainty that the fund will be needed when May revenue projections are released.

The current-year hole and next year’s projected $450-million shortfall are expected to grow substantially. But anything taken from the rainy-day fund must be repaid in the following budget year, according to state law.

“The way things are going, we don’t need a rainy-day fund, we need a typhoon fund,” DaPonte said, adding that the state is facing “the worst economic conditions since the Great Depression.”

Even before the Senate finished voting, interest groups were already jockeying for position with an eye toward the budget year that begins July 1.

Having lost $31 million in the plan approved Thursday, hospital leaders, including Lifespan CEO George Vecchione, met with House Speaker William J. Murphy and other legislators behind closed doors. Following the meeting, participants said no decisions were made but that House leaders appeared open to making concessions.

“The Assembly could always revisit the budget through an additional supplemental [budget revision this year],” said meeting participant Edward J. Quinlan, president of the Hospital Association of Rhode Island.

But Connors later suggested there wasn’t much hope, even for the state’s most vulnerable groups.

“I want money for hospitals. And I want money for nursing homes. And I want money for developmentally disabled communities. I do. I honestly do. But we went to the well and the water was dry. There was nothing there. There was air in the bucket,” he said. “None of us ran for office to inflict pain across the board. But unfortunately, you’ve got to play the hand you’re dealt.”

cneedham@projo.com