Nebraska Gov Pete Ricketts delivers his final State of the State Address Thursday morning at 9:00 MT, unveiling his state budget proposal.
Nebraska’s current two-year state budget is projected to grow by an average of 1.8% annually to reach almost $9.8-billion dollars by June of next year.
Ricketts says he expects to “fine-tune” that budget but will oppose large spending increases except for one-time items such as infrastructure and water projects, which would use Nebraska’s billion dollars in federal COVID stimulus funds.
The Republican governor says he’s OK using the federal pandemic money on such one-time expenses, but he doesn’t support a big bump in spending of state tax dollars.
After he delivers his speech, Ricketts will start a 2-day, 5-city fly-in trip to expand on the proposals in the address. The schedule include a news conference in Scottsbluff Thursday afternoon at 2:30 in the terminal at the Western Nebraska Regional Airport.