The House Appropriations Committee approved legislative transfer request 02/1958, a package that House Fiscal Agency analysts described as largely technical shifts to align spending authorizations with actual expenditures and to accept restricted revenues. HFA told the committee standard transfers in the package total $585,500,000 and contingency authorization transfers total $73,700,000, an increase to the FY25 budget of roughly 0.09%.

Robin Risco of the House Fiscal Agency briefed the committee on the mechanics. "A transfer is an accounting adjustment that is made to increase or decrease expenditure authority for line items within department budgets," Risco said. She told members transfers cannot create new line items or programs and are typically used to move spending authorization between existing line items so final appropriations align with expenditures.

Members pressed analysts on several headline items. Rep. Van Werkom and Rep. Rogers asked about psychiatric hospital authorizations; HFA analyst Kevin Korscher explained that authorization is being shifted from Kalamazoo and Reuther to Caro and the Forensic Center because some facilities are at higher operating costs and others have units offline for renovation. Korscher said the primary driver is personnel costs, including higher staffing and overtime at the receiving facilities.

On Medicaid health-plan shortfalls and pharmacy spending, HFA said the state budget office and enacted supplemental together would cover the shortfall going forward. Regarding pharmaceutical services, HFA explained that timing of manufacturer rebates creates substantial quarterly volatility in recorded expenditures; when fourth-quarter rebates are booked the net shortfall will be smaller. Korscher said that once rebate savings are booked for the quarter the pharmacy line would be short approximately $38,000,000 rather than several hundred million shown in an early data pull.

Rep. Mueller asked about a State Police transfer and a recent settlement; Aaron Meek of House Fiscal said the transfer reflected revenue from sales of older fleet vehicles and was not directly tied to the settlement, and offered to follow up with more detail.

Natural resource transfers drew questions about federal recreation grants and how proceeds from hunting and fishing license sales are used; Austin Scott of House Fiscal explained which line items were federal grant-supported vs. funded from the game-and-fish protection account.

After discussion, the committee voted to approve the transfer package. The clerk recorded 15 ayes, 0 nays and 9 passes on the motion to approve legislative transfer request 02/1958 as presented. The committee then excused absent members and adjourned.

Committee members signaled they will continue oversight on psychiatric hospital capacity, staffing and the mechanics of pharmacy rebate accounting as the budget process proceeds.