The Senate's proposed $20.05 billion budget relies on an average of two more students in classrooms across the state.
Increasing class size to 20 students in K-3 and 22 in grades 4-12 would save $320 million annually, said Sen. Linda Garrou, the senate's senior budget writer and a Winston-Salem Democrat.
The class size proposal is likely to find favor among Republicans who have previously called for the change.
Garrou and her fellow appropriations committee co-chairs gave a peek at the Senate's budget Monday. The full document will be available online at 7 p.m. The details released so far highlight a document that differs from Gov. Beverly Perdue's budget in several key areas.
The budget would lay off as many as 712 state employees and eliminate some 900 vacant positions. Perdue's proposal would have sought to keep layoffs to a pool of fewer than 300 employees.
The leaders of state departments would have targets to meet in cuts. Officials could make the cuts in several ways including furloughs, said Sen. A.B. Swindell, a Nashville Democrat. Perdue said she avoided furloughs because she feared the message it would send to businesses and investors about the state's financial condition.
The Senate budget cuts some $2 billion from state spending. It is unclear what specific programs would be cut. The budget would save some $40 million by merging Gov. Mike Easley's signature More at Four program with Gov. Jim Hunt's Smart Start program.
The Senate budget relies on some $580 million in new revenue. Unlike Perdue's budget, which would raise new money from new alcohol and tobacco taxes, the Senate budget would rely on a new package of revenue options that will be unveiled later.
Federal economic recovery money would generally be used for one-time spending.
"The stimulus money is there to backfill," Swindell said.
State employees would see no pay raises. Teachers would get step increases, which are pay hikes for teachers who have achieved a certain level of experience.
The budget would close some prisons, but fewer than the seven Perdue called for in her budget proposal.
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