The House Finance Committee, preparing to question department heads today about current-year overspending, met yesterday to get an overview of the problem. House fiscal staff members Nobel Jeudy, right, John-Paul Berducci and Ed Cooney listen as Sharon Reynolds Ferland, House deputy fiscal adviser, makes a presentation to the panel.

The Providence Journal / Connie Grosch

PROVIDENCE — Rhode Island lawmakers will begin grilling department heads today on how they overspent their budgets by millions of dollars, contributing to the state’s $357-million current-year deficit.

Last year, 20 of the state’s 45 departments exceeded their budgets, and early projections this year show that they are on track to do the same.

“The message here is that too many agencies are overspending,” said House Finance Committee Chairman Steven M. Costantino, D-Providence, who placed at least some of the blame on the Carcieri administration. “…Ultimately, the enforcement of the budget and the implementation of the budget is the administration’s responsibility.”

His comments followed the second in a series of unusual off-session meetings of the Finance Committee yesterday in which members got a dissected view of Rhode Island’s ailing finances.

While two-thirds of the state’s massive current-year deficit is due to declines in revenue sources, Rhode Island has also managed to outspend appropriations in more than half its agencies.

This afternoon, each of the major department directors will be called to the basement committee room to explain their spending habits.

“Certainly, one of the things we want to know is what are their management systems? How do they monitor their own directors and how do they ensure that line items aren’t being overspent?” Costantino said. “…It’s the administration’s role to monitor their budgets, but it’s our role to provide the kind of oversight and pressure points to make sure that kind of monitoring is happening.”

Fellow committee member Thomas C. Slater, D-Providence, offered more pointed criticism. “Are these departments at fault for the overspending? Of course they are. They’re responsible for their budgets.” But he said it’s hard to know what’s going on inside the agencies without speaking with them directly.

Today’s hearing, he noted, will prove essential to understanding how expenditures went awry.

While some of the state’s overruns were unforeseen –– including the $10 million taxpayers must contribute to the Station nightclub fire settlement fund, and the costly resolution of a long-running dispute with the Rhode Island Brotherhood of Correctional Officers –– others are the result of delays in the launch of cost-saving initiatives, including human service program cuts.

The governor has said he could save $67 million this year by changing the state’s Medicaid system, a process he dubs “the global Medicaid waiver.” So far, none of those savings has been achieved, despite the fact that the fiscal year is now one-quarter over.

Carcieri spokeswoman Amy Kempe said department directors will answer any of the chairman’s questions regarding their budgets when they appear this afternoon. Heads of all the major state agencies have been asked to address the committee. Kempe could not say which ones will appear.

Costantino says he will keep a particularly close eye on state agencies such as the Department of Environmental Management and the higher education system that seem to have developed a habit of overspending year after year.

But committee member and East Providence Republican John Savage questioned whether certain overruns are the result of unrealistic budgeting. Earlier this year, for example, the governor proposed a series of unpaid days off for state workers. They didn’t materialize, but lawmakers booked the savings anyway.

“Are we not creating a problem for ourselves for booking savings that might not occur?” Savage asked.

Yesterday’s briefing came the same day that Moody’s Investors Service released a detailed analysis reaffirming the state’s negative outlook, as publicized last week. The report offered an independent analysis of the budget problems that threaten the state’s credit rating.

“Rhode Island’s credit outlook is negative reflecting Moody’s concerns that the state faces significant hurdles to achieve structural budget balance in the near term given current revenue under-performance, repeated reliance on one-time actions to close recent budget gaps, and persistent spending challenges,” the report found.

cneedham@projo.com