Budgeting, education, transportation among top issues for 2024 legislative session

Mounting financial pressures on Maryland’s ambitious education, transportation and climate plans are set to loom large in the coming months as the Maryland General Assembly returns to Annapolis to begin its annual legislative session Wednesday.

Lawmakers on both sides of the aisle say addressing rising concerns about public safety is their top policy priority heading into the 90-day lawmaking sprint. Passing legislation to address vacancies in elected office, as well as how terminally ill people could end their own lives, are on the agenda for some Democrats, who control supermajorities of both chambers.

But the budgetary issues — including an immediate structural deficit and long-term plans that would leave taxpayers on the hook for billions of dollars in future costs — have come into focus recently. That’s set the stage for debates over approving new taxes or other revenue options this year and in the next two years.

Democratic Gov. Wes Moore has warned about fiscal responsibility as the state faces a projected $761 million deficit in the budget that begins July 1, growing to $2.7 billion four years later. His administration has detailed $3.3 billion in cuts to the state’s six-year transportation agenda, while maintaining support for the multibillion-dollar Blueprint education reform plan and announcing climate goals that would cost $1 billion more per year.

State government observers say policymakers have options to consider, including increasing taxes on corporations and higher-income earners, though it’s unclear if Moore and legislative leaders will work toward a significant new revenue plan this year.

“We would only look at raising taxes or anything like that if it was absolutely necessary,” House Speaker Adrienne A. Jones, a Baltimore County Democrat, said in an interview Thursday. “We do know that we have some tough decisions to make, and we’ve been looking at all of our options to raise additional revenue.”

Some lawmakers said the time for those conversations is now.

“This is probably the session when this should be taking place,” said Sen. Cory McCray, a Baltimore Democrat. “The responsible thing to do is recognize that everything is on the table.”

One area of particular concern for McCray and other Baltimore-area legislators — establishing a new transportation funding system — may be passed over until at least 2025. A commission of government officials, transportation experts and community advocates tasked with creating solutions for the Maryland Transportation Trust Fund is not due to issue final recommendations until a year from now. Initial recommendations announced in a new report include considering an increase in registration fees or implementing new fees just for electric vehicles — which do not contribute to gas taxes, the largest portion of the trust fund — and expanding tolling.

Some of the recommendations are specific to this session, though Senate President Bill Ferguson said before the report’s release that he does not anticipate passing new laws around transportation funding until the Transportation Revenue and Infrastructure Needs (TRAIN) Commission is finished with its work next year. He said he’s also not inclined to support Moore’s idea to eliminate automatic increases in the state’s gas tax. The governor says they harm working families; Ferguson stresses they’re the main financing mechanism for maintaining roads, bridges and transit.

Del. Stephanie Smith, a Baltimore Democrat who serves on the House Appropriations Committee, said lawmakers shouldn’t wait for the final TRAIN recommendations to address the proposed transportation cuts, which she called “incredibly detrimental” for the Baltimore region. While core transit service in the Baltimore area will be maintained, pulling back on some planned improvements risks future service and safety, lawmakers say.

“I made it abundantly clear to the Moore administration that this is not something that we’re going to take lying down,” Smith said. She said the administration has been receptive and there will be further conversations about how to adjust the cuts before the end of the session.

One area of pushback, McCray said, will likely be over a plan to pause a scheduled increase in the share of highway user revenue that goes to local governments, a step that would save the state $245 million through 2029. Baltimore, which is responsible for maintaining more state roads than other jurisdictions, gets a higher portion of the funding and McCray worked on a law to increase the city’s and other local governments’ share. Changing it would require legislative approval.

Another looming funding hole that lawmakers face is the Maryland Department of the Environment’s new plan to meet mandated greenhouse gas emission reductions. The goal to reduce emissions 60% from 2006 levels by 2031 was approved by Democrats in the General Assembly in 2022. Achieving it would cost $1 billion per year, according to a new MDE report. The report recommends several ways to pay for the programs, but does not specifically call for advancing them in 2024.

Jamie DeMarco, Maryland policy director for the Chesapeake Climate Action Network, said the administration should follow through on those plans immediately. He said his group’s priority for the session is a bill that would require companies that sell products in Maryland and have emitted more than a billion tons of greenhouse gas emissions between 2000 and 2018 to pay a one-time fee. The 40 companies that meet that criteria, he said, include energy companies like ExxonMobil and Aramco, and would raise $9 billion over 10 years.

Democratic Sen. Katie Fry Hester of Howard County is sponsoring that bill, dubbed the Responding to Emergency Needs from Extreme Weather Act. She said the money would go toward responding to and preventing natural disasters, and it could contribute to the state’s costly climate plan.

Education rounds out the list of major issues that policymakers have already committed to spending billions of dollars without a financing plan.

Lawmakers approved the Blueprint for Maryland’s Future in 2020, requiring nearly $4 billion more in kindergarten-through-12th-grade spending per year after a decade. They put the first major investment in the plan last year — a $900 million infusion to keep the fund balanced through the 2027 fiscal year — but it remains the state’s largest driver of future costs.

“We’ve known from the time we passed the Blueprint that there was going to come a year that we were going to have to make some serious decisions on how we’re going to pay for it,” said Sen. Jim Rosapepe, a Prince George’s County Democrat. “That’s not a surprise.”

Whether lawmakers look to invest more in the plan this year or look seriously at solving the long-term funding issue is unclear. Smith, who is sponsoring a bill to fully fund positions of Blueprint “coordinators” in each jurisdiction, said it’s critical “not to lose any ground” on the plan. But she said it was too early to identify total new investments needed this year.

As options to fund such investments start circulating in Annapolis, Smith supports a plan known as a “millionaire’s tax” that she introduced in 2021. It would raise the maximum personal income tax rate to 7% for those earning more than $1 million. Under current law, individuals earning more than $250,000 and couples earning more than $300,000 pay a maximum rate of 5.75%.

“They still pay the same tax rate as people that pay millions,” Smith said. “It doesn’t make any sense.”

House Appropriations Committee Vice Chair Del. Mark Chang, an Anne Arundel County Democrat, said new large revenue plans are being developed, though it may take time to pass them.

“It’s going to be challenging,” Chang said. “We’ve got to look at ways to make our state as robust as possible.”

Republican leaders, meanwhile, say they’ll push back on ideas like a millionaire’s tax or increasing tolling.

House Minority Leader Jason Buckel said the governor’s office and Democratic leaders have “got to start being honest with themselves.”

“We probably can’t pay for the Blueprint unless we have very, very large tax increase,” Buckel said, adding that among his party’s priorities will be a bill to make Blueprint spending requirements for local governments “more flexible” as officials around the state raise concerns about the mandated increases in the coming years.

Public safety, elections, and physician-assisted suicide

Lawmakers will also turn their eyes back to juvenile justice in 2024, following a spate of car thefts committed by kids across the state and cries of frustration from constituents in the face of recently passed reforms.

In 2022, the General Assembly passed bills to limit the charges children under 13 face. They also require police to immediately notify a child’s parent or guardian when they are taken into custody and to provide them the opportunity to speak with an attorney before answering questions.

State law does not bar officers from talking to kids when they aren’t in custody. Regardless, law enforcement and prosecutors say the changes inhibit their ability to do their jobs. Republican legislators have called for rolling both policies back and said a GOP package of bills to increase criminal penalties is their priority.

“From Day 1 until the last day, we will continue to talk about public safety and continue to press our Democrat colleagues to be accountable for the issues that are out there,” Senate Minority Leader Steve Hershey said in an interview.

Some Democratic lawmakers, however, say some of those concerns are misplaced.

“The law is clear. But police and prosecutors have to read it, as well as media — journalists — and I think a lot of people didn’t read the law,” said Baltimore Sen. Jill P. Carter, a Democrat who ushered the bill to the governor’s desk in 2022.

Ferguson didn’t indicate an interest in doing away with the 2022 reforms, but said tweaks could be made to clarify them. House Judiciary Committee Chair Luke Clippinger, a Baltimore Democrat, hosted three juvenile justice policy briefings in the fall to discuss how to move forward. There are plans to introduce a bill the first week of the legislative session based on the briefings.

Carter remains firm in her conviction that the law is not a hindrance to policing.

“I want to sit and listen to the claims of some of those that insist that the law needs to be tweaked,” she said. “I have listened, for the most part, to the House hearings and I have not heard anything legitimate that would warrant changing the law.”

Legislators will also seek to update election policy. Democratic Sen. Cheryl Kagan of Montgomery County, the vice chair of the Education, Energy and the Environment Committee, is sponsoring a slew of bills, such as one that would update the vote recount process. If passed, it would go into effect before the May 14 primary.

Another bill sponsored by Kagan would create a Nov. 5 ballot referendum. Voters could opt to end the method by which a political party in a county fills a vacancy when a legislator leaves office during a term. More than a dozen of Montgomery County’s 32 state lawmakers were selected by the Montgomery County Democratic Central Committee and appointed by the governor.

“I believe in a democracy, it’s the voters who should pick their representatives,” she said.

The 2024 legislative session will see another push for the End-of-Life Option Act, which would exempt a doctor from liability if they prescribed fatal drugs that a patient with a terminal diagnosis took themselves. Only Maryland residents who were expected to die within six months and can make their own medical decisions would qualify.

Senate Judicial Proceedings Committee Vice Chair Jeff Waldstreicher was a main sponsor of the bill in 2020 and 2023. In an interview Tuesday, the Montgomery County Democrat said that the bill will be introduced with the same language as last year.