AUGUSTA – Maine lawmakers settled on a budget late Monday night that makes about $130 million in cuts in state spending. The budget bill relied on increased revenue from the sale of unclaimed securities by the state treasurer and fee increases to make up the rest of the $190 million projected shortfall needed to keep the state in the black.

After lengthy public hearings and heated debates among legislators, the dust has begun to settle.

“We have worked diligently to gather the best possible consensus for all Maine people,” state Senate President Beth Edmunds said Monday.

Major sticking points along the way to a balanced budget included proposed cuts to the Office of Program Evaluation and Government Accountability, or OPEGA, cuts to the Maine Clean Elections Fund and the continued inclusion of childless adults in MaineCare.

The Appropriations Committee included cuts in its budget that would have eliminated five of the seven OPEGA employees and combine it with the State Office of Fiscal and Program Review, as part of a streamlining initiative to close the structural gap in the state budget.

But lawmakers on both sides of the aisle protested the cuts and the OPEGA language was removed from the overall budget.

“OPEGA is an invaluable tool for the Legislature, offering the benefits of logical and reasoned decision-making on behalf of the taxpayers,” wrote Reps. Mike Vaughan, R-Durham, and Andrea Boland, D-Sanford, in an op-ed piece printed in the Sun Journal last Friday. “So far, in its short existence, OPEGA has sifted through $630,892,590 of annual expenditures and shown a potential for cost avoidance of $20,321,040, plus another $2 million in reduction of current expenses.”

Some legislators also mentioned the Maine Clean Elections Fund as a place ripe for cuts. First available to state legislative candidates in 2000 as a means of weaning the politicians from depending on private interest fundraising, the fund now supports the majority of legislative candidates. According to the Maine Citizens for Clean Elections, 84 percent of legislators used Clean Election funding.

Although deeper cuts were proposed, the Legislature decided to only cut allocations to Maine Clean Elections candidates in the 2008 legislative races by 5 percent, creating $270,000 in savings.

Lawmakers also sought compromise when it came to continuing MaineCare coverage for childless adults, or “non-categoricals.” The “non-cats” consist of adults aged 19 to 64 who do not have minor children at home, are not fully disabled and have income below 100 percent of the federal poverty limit, or $10,400 annually. Twenty-five percent of “non-cats” are between 50 and 64 and earn an average of $5,300 annually.

Gov. John Baldacci’s budget proposal included the elimination of prescription drug coverage to the “non-cats” and the Republican budget plan proposed cutting about half of the approximately 18,500 “non-cats” enrolled in MaineCare.

But Democrats rejected both proposals, and in the budget passed late Monday, no enrollment cuts were made and the prescription drug coverage to “non-cats” was amended to reduce costs, but maintained access to the benefit.

Ultimately, the state budget cuts left virtually no program untouched as lawmakers sought to mitigate the burden by spreading it around.

“A lot of the cuts are very small, taking $5,000 out of various office accounts and then it adds up,” said Tim Feeley, spokesman for House Speaker Glenn Cummings, D-Portland.

More than 70 state employee positions were eliminated.

Cuts

$34.1 million cut in state funding to local schools

$5.7 million in cuts to child welfare and foster care services

$3.5 million in cuts to prescription drug benefits to childless adults in MaineCare

$3 million cut to the University of Maine System

$1.8 million in cuts to clinical services provided to children in state custody

$1 million cut to Maine Community College System

$1 million cut to the court system

$560,000 cut to Attorney General’s Office

$500,000 cuts to Temporary Aid for Needy Families

Increased revenue or savings

$28 million in expected savings on state employee health insurance through preventative health care and wellness steps

$9 million in sale of unclaimed securities by the state treasurer

$356,200 from an account at Department of Conservation that was set aside for a helicopter

New fees

$1,000 license fee on certificate of approval for malt liquor and for wine for out-of-state alcohol manufacturers (was $600)

$200 fee assessed by courts for fulfilling summary judgment requests

$31 fee for criminal background checks (was $25)

$25 enrollment fee for parents of children in the State Children’s Health Insurance Program

Statistics on the budget were provided by the House Speaker’s Office and reflect the biennium.