PROVIDENCE — After facing months of noisy protest rallies and budget hearings that stretched late into the night, the legislature’s budget writers are on the verge of unveiling their final budget, cutting and spending for this deficit-wracked year and next.

The House Finance Committee marked this critical juncture in the waning legislative session by posting notice yesterday of its plans to unveil and vote tomorrow on an as-yet-unseen version of the new state budget for the year that begins on July 1.

As veteran State House observers know, the meeting may be postponed for hours, days, and longer than that if the House, the Senate, and in some years the governor’s office, are unable to reach agreements as happened with the midyear budget-repair bill that was posted and postponed numerous times before finally clearing the House Finance Committee earlier this spring.

But when asked the likelihood that House Finance will vote on the bill tomorrow, House spokesman Larry Berman said: “They are likely to do the budget on Wednesday but it is always subject to any last-minute change in scheduling.”

The bill in its current state reflects the $6.8-billion state and federally financed budget that Republican Governor Carcieri proposed early this winter. It sought to close the state’s massive deficit by cutting millions from the state’s public colleges, slashing non-school municipal aid, diverting hundreds of elderly from nursing homes, dramatically reducing eligibility for the state’s welfare and subsidized health-care programs, replacing hundreds of state employees with private contractors and allowing 200 prisoners to leave the Adult Correctional Institutions early.

Since then revenue estimates have dropped, and the potential deficit next year has swelled to $425 million by one estimate, though the governor and others believe it may be higher.

To plug a hole of that magnitude, lawmakers have had to at least consider program cuts that would go well beyond what Carcieri proposed, with organized labor — and some impassioned community activists — urging more dramatic steps ranging from tax hikes, to the reversal or postponement of income tax cuts for the state’s wealthiest citizens, to sale of the state Lottery.

But key lawmakers were on the golf course of the Valley Country Club in West Warwick, at what one described as a charity fundraiser hosted by House Speaker William J. Murphy. The players reportedly included the chairmen of the House and Senate Finance Committees, Steven Costantino, D-Providence, and Stephen Alves, D-West Warwick.

So details on the final budget package were hard to come by, with lobbyists and advocates anxious and nervous amid a swirl of rumors.

Back at the State House, Senate Majority Leader M. Teresa Paiva Weed, D-Newport, said: “I certainly anticipate that we will be accepting many of the proposals that the governor has made toward cuts. What we have all been working towards — including the governor’s office — is addressing those cuts which would have the most direct … and negative economic impact on individuals.” She was hopeful, but wary of upsetting delicate negotiations though she acknowledged there was little appetite among legislators for some of the tax-hiking options urged by some advocates, such as rolling back the capital gains tax cuts of recent years or halting the phased adoption of the flat-tax that primarily benefits the state’s wealthiest taxpayers.

Having also sat out the golf tournament in 95-degree heat, Rep. Thomas Slater, D-Providence, said the cutting-and-spending plan for 2008-09 is “still a work in progress on most of the issues because there is no consensus.” He said about “90 percent settled, but that 10 percent is very tough.”

Responding to rumors that Carcieri’s negotiating team had reached budget-cutting terms with the major state employee unions, Carcieri’s communication director John Robitaille said: “For weeks, the governor’s office has been in intense negotiations with the public employee unions in an attempt to gain the necessary contract concessions that would help close the budget gap. While it appears that there is some movement, we are at a critical point in the talks and it would not be prudent to disclose specifics of these negotiations. All options are still on the table.”

“The governor is still convinced that the budget will be balanced without raising taxes and without touching the rainy day fund,” he added.

Meanwhile yesterday, the Rhode Island Chamber of Commerce Coalition, a group of 13 chambers of commerce in Rhode Island, representing more than 12,500 member businesses, launched a campaign to persuade legislators and “particularly members of the House Finance Committee” to “oppose new and increased taxes as a way to balance the state’s budget woes.”

— With reports by Cynthia Needham of the State House Bureau

kgregg@projo.com