AEGiS-BAYW: Senate budget good on HIV/AIDS

Important note: Information in this article was accurate in 2007. The state of the art may have changed since the publication date.

Senate budget good on HIV/AIDS

Bay Windows - May 17, 2007
Ethan Jacobs, ejacobs@baywindows.com

The Senate Ways and Means Committee released its Fiscal Year 2008 (FY08) budget recommendations May 16, and the budget includes substantially more funding for the state's HIV/AIDS programs than the proposal released by the House last month. The Senate increased the HIV/AIDS budget line item by about $550,000, bringing the total AIDS line item up to $36,941,316. That increase is identical to the one found in Gov. Deval Patrick's February budget proposal, but it far exceeds the $20,000 increase proposed by the House. The full Senate will debate the Ways and Means proposal next week. Following passage of a budget bill by the Senate, the two chambers will work to craft a compromise budget in a conference committee.

While the Senate budget contained good news for HIV/AIDS advocates, the outlook for LGBT elder programming is less certain. In the FY07 budget the LGBT Aging Project received $50,000 in state funding through the Department of Elder Affairs, and that funding was preserved in the House. In the Senate Ways and Means budget the line item that contained the LGBT Aging Project funding received a $300,000 increase, but the earmark for the LGBT Aging Project was removed. Dale Mitchell, co-founder of the LGBT Aging Project and executive director of the elder service agency Ethos, said that he will ask allies in the Senate to file an amendment to re-insert the earmark.

"We will be looking to have the earmarking language inserted into the Senate budget through an amendment so we're totally secure as the budget continues through the conference committee and onto the governor's desk," said Mitchell.

The Gay Men's Domestic Violence Project (GMDVP) will also seek additional funding through the amendment process for LGBT domestic violence programs. Under the Senate proposal those programs were level funded at $158,000, but GMDVP Executive Director Curt Rogers said that funding level has been inadequate to provide resources to LGBT victims of domestic violence. Rogers said Sen. Jarrett Barrios will file an amendment to increase funding by $500,000 for safe housing and other services.

The Senate Ways and Means Committee level-funded LGBT youth programs in the state budget, providing $350,000 to the Massachusetts Commission on Gay and Lesbian Youth through the Department of Public Health and $150,000 for Safe Schools programs through the Department of Education.

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