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Highlights of cuts and savings

02:26 PM EST on Friday, February 1, 2008

Cuts and savings proposed by the governor in his spending plan for fiscal year 2008-09 include:

- Cutting eligibility for the state's subsidized health care program, RIte Care, for parents with incomes from 185 percent of the federal poverty level ($32,560 for a family of three) to 133 percent ($23,408 for a family of three). An estimated 7,396 adults would be affected.

- Cutting eligibility for the state's welfare program, known as the Family Independence Program, from five years to two years. The change wouldn't be enforced until July 2009.

Extra

Carcieri relies on spending cuts, fees to close budget deficit

No new taxes in budget plan, but several fees

PDF: Read the executive summary

Your Turn: What do you think of the governor's proposals?

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Jan. 30: Hoping and Coping: Towns come to grips with reality of minimal state aid

Dec. 12: Proposal would cut 400 from Head Start

Dec. 8: The pain of budget cuts: Health plans in jeopardy for 18,000

Nov. 17: Carcieri: Jobs-reduction plan requires changing 'anti-privatization' statute

- Freezing state education aid at current levels for almost all school districts.

- Cutting non-school municipal aid by $12.7 million as was recommended in the governor's mid-year spending revision plan.

- Saving $3.7 million by reducing 300 children from the child welfare system's residential placements, including 60 children currently housed in out-of-state programs.

- Savings of more than $1 million through a series of "good time" provisions that would allow hundreds of prisoners to leave the Adult Correctional Institutions early. The plan would give well-behaved prisoners, with the exception of sexual offenders, the chance to slice 10 days per month off their sentences. Corrections Director A.T. Wall said the early-release plan, if approved, will reduce the daily prison population by about 211 next year.

- Approximately $60.6 million in savings through personnel reductions (aside from the governor's previously-announced layoffs). The governor's staff would not detail how he would achieve the savings and the union leadership says the plans are subject to the collective bargaining process. Most of the major state employees' union contracts expire at the end of June.

- Cuts to community service grants such as the Rhode Island Meals on Wheels ($201,400), Rhode Island Historical Society ($135,132), the Diocese of Providence ($151,867), Crossroads Rhode Island ($225,000), Rhode Island Community Food Bank ($192,000), Providence WaterFire ($150,000), and Rhode Island Legal Services ($135,000).

-- Steve Peoples, Journal State House Bureau