The Senate has now filed its version of the base budget, which includes two supplemental riders. One for $2.3 billion for the biennium that is intended for property tax reductions, and one for $3.7 billion for the biennium that is intended for a teacher salary increase. At the same time, Senator Nelson filed Senate Bill 3 today, which provides for a $5,000 across the board teacher salary increase above the level at which the teacher would have been paid in the 2019-2020 school year using the 2018-2019 salary schedule.
Otherwise, the base budgets look relatively similar as it relates to public education. Both the House and Senate versions provide for increases in enrollment growth (estimated to cost roughly $2.4 billion) and both provide for an increase in the golden penny yield (estimated to cost $2.2 billion). The senate version includes slightly more funding for NIFA ($26 million rather than $$23,750,000).
All in, this puts the Senate spending $4.2 billion more on the FSP (including property tax relief and net of recapture increases) than last biennium compared to a $7.2 billion increase for the House.