Reading an Appropriation Bill and the Legislative Budget Book

Most people never open an appropriation bill. That is understandable, because the first page looks like a spreadsheet printed on a legal pad. But the bill is the law. The headlines about "a 2 percent cut" or "a $350,000 voter pamphlet" come from lines in these tables, and the only way to know whether a number in a story is right is to read the line. This lesson walks through two real FY2027 bills and the book pages that explain them. They were chosen because they are short enough to read in full.

What an appropriation is

The Legislative Fiscal Report glossary defines an appropriation as an amount of spending authority the Legislature gives to an agency or program "for a given purpose for a specified period of time." Three points follow from that definition. It is authority to spend, not cash on hand. It is attached to a purpose and a fund. And it ends: general fund appropriations for fiscal year 2027 run from July 1, 2026 through June 30, 2027, and unspent authority goes away unless the Legislature allows it to be carried over.

The glossary separates several kinds, and each appears in the bills below:

• Original appropriation: the amounts in the regular appropriation bills for the fiscal year.
• Supplemental appropriation: action on the current year that adds funds or transfers between expense classes, funds, programs or agencies.
• Rescission: action on the current year that removes previously enacted spending authority in whole or in part. S1331 of 2026 is the FY2026 example; its fiscal note reports a total FY2026 reduction of $192,656,600, of which $131,321,800 was General Fund (lesson 06 covers it).
• Reappropriation or carryover authority: permission to carry unused spending authority into the next year for onetime expenses. Because it is an exception to the state budget laws, it needs specific legislative authorization.
• Continuous appropriation: an ongoing statutory appropriation not set by annual legislative action.
• Total appropriation: the original plus mid-year adjustments such as supplementals, rescissions and reappropriations.

Why there are two bills for one agency

Until 2024 an agency's budget usually came in one bill. The Idaho Capital Sun reported in April 2024 that JFAC had split agency budgets into two pieces for the first time in recent memory. The first was a "maintenance of current operations" budget, a bare-bones version of the prior year's budget that removed onetime spending and new requests. More than 100 agencies and divisions were grouped into 10 larger maintenance budgets totaling more than $5.1 billion of General Fund spending. The second piece covered new spending increases, budget line items, some replacement items and other new requests, and JFAC considered those separately.

The people who set it up and the people who questioned it spoke differently, and both are on the record in that article:

• JFAC co-chairs Representative Wendy Horman and Senator Scott Grow said the split increased transparency and let members scrutinize new spending more closely.
• Senator Janie Ward-Engelking said the process did not save time and was not more transparent, and that the maintenance budgets did not include replacement items or nondiscretionary costs.
• Representative Britt Raybould questioned whether the word "maintenance" described what the bills contained.
• On February 2, 2024, 12 of JFAC's 20 members, with Horman absent, passed standalone budgets against the maintenance versions, and the House narrowly passed the original maintenance budgets on February 7.

The structure persisted. In the FY2027 cycle, the 2026 Legislative Fiscal Report has a table titled "FY 2027 Appropriation Bills by Agency" with two columns for each agency, "PM Bill #" and "ENH Bill #." The Secretary of State's maintenance bill is H866 and its enhancement bill is H952. The Fiscal Report's glossary defines the maintenance budget as the funding needed "to maintain the same level of service or activity" as the current year. For a reader this means that to find an agency's whole FY2027 budget you must find both bills and add them. Some agencies show "n/a" for the enhancement bill, because they had no enhancements.

Walking through H.B. 866

H.B. 866 is the FY2027 maintenance bill for the Constitutional Officers. Its bill page records the dates: introduced March 11, 2026; passed the House 61 to 8 on March 13 and the Senate 32 to 3 on March 18; signed by the Governor March 25, 2026 as session law chapter 127; effective July 1, 2026. The sponsor is the Appropriations Committee.

The title is a table of contents

Idaho bills carry a long title that lists what the act does. H866's title names six offices: the Attorney General, the State Controller, the Executive Office of the Governor, the Lieutenant Governor, the Secretary of State and the State Treasurer. It then lists, in order, everything the later sections do: limits full-time equivalent positions, exempts three offices from transfer limits, gives reappropriation authority, provides for indirect cost recovery, transfers cash from the Technology Infrastructure Stabilization Fund, provides for cash balance reconciliation, sets requirements for bank service fees and gives the Treasurer continuous appropriation authority for one fund. If a topic is not in the title, the bill generally does not do it. Reporters use the title as a checklist.

Section 1: the table

Section 1 appropriates money "to be expended according to the designated programs and expense classes from the listed funds for the period July 1, 2026, through June 30, 2027." Each office is divided into programs, each program lists funds, and each fund has dollar amounts in up to four expense classes. The Fiscal Report glossary defines the classes:

Column	Abbreviation	What it pays for (Fiscal Report glossary)
For personnel costs	PC	Salaries of employees, including part-time, irregular and seasonal help and compensation of board and commission members, plus the employer share of retirement, health and life insurance, workers' compensation and similar costs
For operating expenditures	OE	Private contract services, travel, consumable supplies, software and minor equipment with a life of less than two years
For capital outlay	CO	Land, buildings, highways and equipment with a useful life substantially more than two years
For trustee and benefit payments	T/B	Payments passed through to an individual or another governmental entity that provides a service

Here is the Secretary of State's part of the table, as printed in H866 (all from the General Fund):

Program	Personnel costs	Operating expenditures	Total
A. Secretary of State	$3,692,300	$1,883,800	$5,576,100
B. Commission on Uniform State Laws		$60,500	$60,500
Division total	$3,692,300	$1,944,300	$5,636,600

Check it: $3,692,300 plus $1,883,800 is $5,576,100. Add the $60,500 commission and you get $5,636,600, the division total. That $5,636,600 is the "FY 2027 Program Maintenance" figure in the H952 fiscal note and in the Fiscal Report, which is how you know the bill and the books agree. Section 2 of the bill then limits the office to 35.50 full-time equivalent positions, and the Fiscal Report repeats it: the Secretary of State is authorized no more than 35.50 positions at any point from July 1, 2026 through June 30, 2027. The commission has no positions.

A table with several funds

The Secretary of State has only the General Fund. The Attorney General's State Legal Services program shows how a program draws on several funds, and the same arithmetic works across rows and down columns:

Fund	Personnel costs	Operating expenditures	Total
General Fund	$26,021,900	$1,289,000	$27,310,900
Miscellaneous Revenue Fund	$364,500	$28,300	$392,800
Consumer Protection Fund	$350,200	$153,000	$503,200
Idaho Millennium Income Fund	$274,100	$2,400	$276,500
Federal Grant Fund	$1,008,100	$209,300	$1,217,400
Total, State Legal Services	$28,018,800	$1,682,000	$29,700,800

Down the personnel column: $26,021,900 plus $364,500 plus $350,200 plus $274,100 plus $1,008,100 equals $28,018,800. Down the operating column: $1,289,000 plus $28,300 plus $153,000 plus $2,400 plus $209,300 equals $1,682,000. The two totals add to $29,700,800, which matches the sum of the right-hand column. Notice the Idaho Millennium Income Fund line: that is the tobacco settlement income account from lesson 06, and it is paying part of the Attorney General's staff. The same fund pays $80,000 of operating expenditures in the State Treasurer's table. The fund detail in the bill is the only place a reader learns that.

The grand total at the bottom of Section 1 is $89,468,100, made of $55,018,000 for personnel, $33,364,000 for operating, $62,800 for capital outlay and $1,023,300 for trustee and benefit payments. Add them: $55,018,000 plus $33,364,000 is $88,382,000. Add $62,800 and you have $88,444,800, then add $1,023,300 for $89,468,100.

One practical warning. If you copy these tables out of a PDF, the text can come out shuffled, because the original is typeset with strike-through amendments and several columns. Verify every number by adding it, as above, and look at the page image before you quote a figure.

The sections after the money

Sections 2 to 15 of H866 are where the policy lives. In summary:

Section	What it does
2	FTP authorization, in accordance with Section 67-3519, Idaho Code. Limits: Governor's office 17.00, Lieutenant Governor 3.00, Attorney General 227.40, State Controller 125.00, Secretary of State 35.50, State Treasurer 30.00. The Governor can authorize more, and JFAC must be notified promptly
3, 4, 5	Exemptions from Idaho Code 67-3511 for the Governor's office (expense class and program transfers), the Lieutenant Governor (expense class transfers) and the Attorney General (both). The text adds that appropriations "shall not be transferred from one fund to another fund unless expressly approved by the Legislature"
6	Reappropriation for the Secretary of State: unspent balances for election integrity audits and elections system upgrades from FY2026 carry into FY2027. The Controller must confirm the amounts with the Legislative Services Office first
7	Indirect cost recovery: money assessed by DFM under 67-3531 for State Controller services goes to the Indirect Cost Recovery Fund, and on June 30, 2027 the amount assessed in the cost allocation plan moves to the General Fund
8, 9	Reappropriation for the State Controller: up to $2,500,000 from the Data Processing Services Fund for onetime Computer Service Center costs, and General Fund balances for the behavioral health reporting data system
10	Cash transfer: unencumbered cash from the Technology Infrastructure Stabilization Fund to the control agency account
11	Cash balance reconciliation: the Controller must reconcile cash in the Luma accounting system against the Treasury's TATRS records for every month from July 1, 2023 through June 30, 2026, and report to JFAC and LSO at the fall interim meeting or by October 16, 2026, whichever is earlier
12	Bank service fees: no more than $406,600 from the General Fund and $221,700 from the Professional Services Fund
13	Continuous appropriation for the America250 Commemoration Fund, for the purpose in Idaho Code 57-832
14, 15	The appropriations are subject to the bill's conditions and limitations; an emergency is declared so the act takes effect July 1, 2026

Section 11 is worth stopping on, because it is a good model of what the sections after the money can do. It does not spend anything. It orders the State Controller to finish a reconciliation and report to the committee by a date. That date, October 16, 2026, has passed as this lesson is written. Whether the report was delivered, and what it found, is a question a reader can put to the Controller's office or the Legislative Services Office. I did not find the report in the sources reviewed.

The enhancement bill: H.B. 952

H.B. 952 is one page. Its title says it appropriates "additional moneys" to the Office of the Secretary of State for FY2027. Section 1 begins "In addition to any other appropriation provided by law," which is the sentence that tells you it adds to H866 rather than replacing it. Its table has two lines, and both come from the General Fund:

Expense class	Amount
Personnel costs	$20,000
Operating expenditures	$215,800
Total	$235,800

The statement of purpose explains three line items behind those two numbers:

1. A onetime appropriation of $350,000 for a voter pamphlet.
2. An ongoing transfer of $20,000 from operating expenditures to personnel costs, to pay overtime instead of compensatory time for the post-election audit team.
3. A 2 percent ongoing General Fund base reduction of $114,200.

Here is the arithmetic. In operating expenditures: plus $350,000 for the pamphlet, minus $114,200 for the base reduction, minus $20,000 moved out to personnel. $350,000 minus $114,200 is $235,800. Minus $20,000 is $215,800, the operating figure in the bill. In personnel costs: plus $20,000 moved in. The two lines together are $215,800 plus $20,000, or $235,800, which is also the net of the first and third items ($350,000 minus $114,200). The transfer of $20,000 changes the split and not the total.

The $20,000 transfer is the sort of line a person skimming the bill might skip. It matters because of Idaho Code 67-3511(1): money appropriated for non-personnel costs cannot be used to pay personnel costs of the same entity, and the Fiscal Report glossary says that without specific authority from the Legislature, moneys may not be transferred into Personnel Costs. The Secretary of State needed the Legislature to move $20,000 into the personnel column. The Budget Book explains why: the office has three employees classified as eligible for overtime and five who are not, and it planned to ask the State Board of Examiners for authority to pay overtime to all eight.

H952 passed the House 67 to 0 with 3 absent, and the Senate 33 to 1 with 1 absent and excused. The Governor signed it April 10, 2026 as session law chapter 322, effective July 1, 2026.

Tying the two bills to the total

The same agency in the Legislative Budget Book

Now turn to the Budget Book. The 2026 Legislative Budget Book is an 800-plus page PDF. Its preface says Section I holds statewide summary reports, charts and historical tables, and Section II holds the detailed budget requests for the executive branch (twenty executive departments and seven constitutional officers), the judicial branch and the legislative branch, with each agency's request set beside the Governor's recommendation. The Secretary of State is in the General Government tab, pages 6-191 through 6-196. Each agency has the same four pages.

Page	Name	What it shows for the Secretary of State
6-191	Historical Summary	Appropriations and actuals by program, fund category and expense class. FY2026 appropriation $5,711,000; FY2027 request $6,090,000; Governor's recommendation $6,005,200; 35.50 FTP. Plus a description of each program and its statutory authority (Section 67-901 for administration)
6-192	Analysis of Funds	Every fund the agency uses, with FY2025 estimated expenditures ($13,433,300 General Fund) against actuals ($5,918,200) and the variance
6-193	Comparative Summary	Decision units in columns: agency request against Governor's recommendation, from the FY2026 original to the FY2027 total
6-194 to 6-196	Budget by Decision Unit	A narrative for each decision unit, with the request and the Governor's recommendation

The Budget Book builds the budget from decision units, which the Fiscal Report glossary describes as specific numbered items in a request. Read them in order, because each one is a step from the old budget to the new:

Decision unit	Agency request	Governor's recommendation
FY2026 original appropriation	$5,711,000	$5,711,000
Prior year reappropriation (elections system)	$7,352,800	$7,352,800
FY2026 total appropriation	$13,063,800	$13,063,800
Governor's holdback (Commission on Uniform State Laws)	($1,900)	($1,900)
Unallocated CEC (S1110)	($11,000)	($11,000)
FY2026 estimated expenditures	$13,050,900	$13,050,900
Removal of onetime expenditures	($7,500,800)	($7,500,800)
Restore rescissions and holdback	$12,900	$12,900
FY2027 base	$5,563,000	$5,563,000
Personnel benefit costs	$126,900	$70,900
Statewide cost allocation	$4,600	$4,600
Change in employee compensation	$28,800	$0
FY2027 program maintenance	$5,723,300	$5,638,500
Voter pamphlet and guide	$350,000	$350,000
Ongoing account transfer	$0	$0
ITS replacement items	$18,600	$18,600
Ongoing reduction (Commission)	($1,900)	($1,900)
FY2027 total	$6,090,000	$6,005,200
Change from FY2026 original	$379,000 (6.6 percent)	$294,200 (5.2 percent)

Test the steps. The base: $13,050,900 minus $7,500,800 plus $12,900 is $5,563,000. The agency's maintenance level: $5,563,000 plus $126,900 plus $4,600 plus $28,800 is $5,723,300. The Governor's maintenance level: $5,563,000 plus $70,900 plus $4,600 plus $0 is $5,638,500. Request total: $5,723,300 plus $350,000 plus $18,600 minus $1,900 is $6,090,000. Recommendation total: $5,638,500 plus $350,000 plus $18,600 minus $1,900 is $6,005,200. The two columns differ only in two places, benefits and the employee compensation line, and the narrative explains each.

• Benefits. The agency used a 26 percent increase in employer-paid health insurance, bringing the annual budgeted amount to $17,770 for full-time employees and $14,220 for part-time. The Governor recommended $16,170 and $12,940, a 14.4 percent increase from FY2026, and variable benefits as requested.
• Employee compensation. The agency was directed to include the cost of a 1 percent salary increase ($28,800). The Governor wrote that increasing salaries "continues to be a priority" but that current revenue projections "do not provide sufficient funds" for FY2027, and recommended $0.
• Voter pamphlet. The office asked for $350,000 ongoing, made up of $200,000 for design and printing and $150,000 for mailing, because in even-numbered years it must distribute a voter pamphlet when a constitutional amendment, initiative or referendum is on the ballot (the book cites Sections 67-453 and 34-1812(c) of Idaho Code). The Governor transmitted the request as submitted.

The Governor's holdback line is the 3 percent temporary reduction of FY2026 spending by executive order, which the Budget Book calls specific to the commission, and then restores in FY2027 as a base adjustment. The Budget Book cites Executive Order No. 2025-05 on this page, while its General Fund Summary cites Executive Order 2025-02 for the statewide reduction, so check the order itself before citing a number.

The same agency in the Legislative Fiscal Report

The Legislative Fiscal Report is the after-session version. Its Secretary of State pages (6-81 to 6-83 in the 2026 edition) have the same columns as the Budget Book and one more: FY2027 Approp. Here are the headline rows.

	FY2025 actual	FY2026 total	FY2027 request	FY2027 Governor's rec	FY2027 enacted
Total, Secretary of State division	$6,413,600	$12,200,900	$6,090,000	$6,005,200	$5,872,400
Personnel costs	$3,312,300	$3,646,900	$3,797,100	$3,712,300	$3,712,300
Operating expenditures	$3,054,600	$8,525,000	$2,279,300	$2,279,300	$2,160,100
Capital outlay	$46,700	$29,000	$13,600	$13,600	$0
FTP	35.50	35.50	35.50	35.50	35.50

Read across the personnel row. The enacted $3,712,300 equals the H866 personnel line of $3,692,300 plus the H952 personnel line of $20,000. Read the operating row: $1,883,800 plus $60,500 plus $215,800 equals $2,160,100. Both tie to the bills. The Legislature enacted $132,800 less than the Governor recommended ($6,005,200 minus $5,872,400). Of that, $13,600 is the capital outlay that was not funded and $119,200 is operating ($2,279,300 minus $2,160,100); personnel is unchanged. It enacted $217,600 less than the agency requested ($6,090,000 minus $5,872,400).

The Fiscal Report page also names the bills: "Bill Number and Chapter: S1331 (Ch. 45), H866 (Ch. 127), H952 (Ch. 322)." S1331 is the FY2026 rescissions act, which reduced current-year onetime General Fund appropriations for the office by $850,000. The Fiscal Report's 2026 highlights explain that in FY2024 the office received a $10,000,000 appropriation for a new elections system to be implemented over up to five years. After a review of how the systems are hosted and managed the office found that moving hosting to vendors would lower long-term cost, which "yielded a savings of $850,000," reverted in the rescission. The H866 statement of purpose says that for the Secretary of State, "in lieu of an ongoing base reduction," the office reverted $850,000 of onetime cash in FY2026. The H952 bill then added a 2 percent base reduction of $114,200 anyway. The documents give both facts; the reasoning that connects them is in the committee record, which I did not review.

The enhancement paragraph in the Fiscal Report states that "line item 1 ... provided a onetime appropriation of $350,000 for a voter pamphlet." Compare that with the Budget Book request for $350,000 ongoing. The enacted version is onetime. It will not be in the base next year, so the office will have to ask again for FY2028 if it wants the pamphlet funded. That is the practical difference between ongoing and onetime, and it is why a story that says "the Legislature funded the voter pamphlet" should say onetime.

How to find what an agency or program got

Questions and answers

Where do I find the bill number for an agency's budget?

In the Legislative Fiscal Report's "Appropriation Bills by Agency" table, or in each agency's pages, which list "Bill Number and Chapter" under the program heading.

What is the difference between a bill number and a session law chapter?

The bill number (H866) is the label while the bill moves. The chapter (127) is the number the signed act gets in the session laws. The bill page gives both.

What does "FTP" mean, and how is it counted?

Full-time equivalent positions. The glossary says one FTP is the work of a person or persons totaling 2,080 hours a year, so two half-time positions count as 1.00. Seasonal and temporary help are not counted in FTP.

What does "emergency" at the end of the bill mean?

Nothing alarming. H866 section 15 and H952 section 2 declare an emergency so the act takes effect on July 1, 2026, the start of the fiscal year, rather than the default effective date of Idaho laws.

What are "conditions, limitations, and restrictions"?

Section 14 of H866 says appropriations are subject to the conditions, limitations and restrictions in the act. They are the intent-style sections: position limits, caps like the bank fee limit in Section 12, required reports like Section 11, and the transfer rules. Treat them as part of the appropriation.

Can an agency spend more than the bill says?

Not from that fund and expense class without further authority. Idaho Code 67-3511 allows some transfers with Board of Examiners consent, and the Legislature can grant exemptions, as H866 does for three offices. Money from sources not known when the appropriation was set can be added through the noncognizable process in the Fiscal Report's glossary, under Idaho Code 67-3516(2), by DFM on behalf of the Board of Examiners.

What is a deficiency warrant?

The glossary describes it as an expenditure authorized by statute for which no specific appropriation is provided until after the expense is incurred, such as fire suppression and agricultural pest eradication. The FY2026 General Fund Budget Report lists deficiency warrants for pests and hazardous materials of $1,316,400.

How do I see a large agency, not just a small one?

The method is the same with more rows. In the Fiscal Report, the Division of Medicaid's FY2027 budget was $5,506,118,400 across all funds, a 4.9 percent increase over the FY2026 original (S1435, S1433, S1446). Add the bills named on the agency's page. Lesson 09 follows Medicaid and school funding to local effects.

Hard questions

"Does splitting the budget into two bills make it more transparent?"

The people who made the change said yes: Representative Horman and Senator Grow described it as letting members scrutinize new spending more closely. Senator Ward-Engelking said it did not save time and was not more transparent, and Representative Raybould questioned the label "maintenance." The record this lesson can offer is mechanical: a reader who wants one agency's full budget now has to find two bills, but the second bill shows every new request and cut in a short list. For the Secretary of State, the enhancement bill fits on one page and has three line items.

"Is a base reduction a real cut if the agency's total goes up?"

The Secretary of State's enacted budget is $161,400 above the FY2026 original, after a $114,200 base reduction. The increase comes from employer-paid benefits ($70,900), cost allocation ($4,600) and the onetime $350,000 voter pamphlet, less the $148,000 of FY2026 onetime items removed from the base ($40,500 for IT replacement items, $45,000 for the Blue Book, $26,000 for the driver's license validation software and $36,500 for the double-fill) and the base reductions of $1,900 and $114,200. Whether one calls that a cut depends on the base. Against the amount the agency needs to do what it did the year before, the base reduction is a reduction; against last year's dollars, the total rose 2.8 percent. A fair report gives both numbers.

"Why does the Legislature exempt some offices from transfer limits?"

H866 sections 3 to 5 exempt the Governor's office, the Lieutenant Governor and the Attorney General from some of the limits in 67-3511, "allowing unlimited transfers" between expense classes or programs, and say money may not move between funds without express approval. The bill does not state its reasons. Supporters of flexibility would argue small offices need to adjust to unexpected costs; supporters of tight limits would argue the Legislature set the amounts by line. The text of the bill is the primary source, and reasoning would be in the JFAC minutes.

"The Budget Book showed one number and the bill another. Which is right?"

The signed bill is the law. The Budget Book is a record of the request and the recommendation at the start of the session. In this lesson the Governor recommended $6,005,200 for the Secretary of State and the Legislature enacted $5,872,400, and both statements are true of different documents. Never put a Budget Book figure in a sentence that says what the agency "got."