The Senate on Wednesday approved a $6 billion state budget for next year, finishing early the main task for lawmakers in this 30-day legislative session.

If the House goes along with changes the Senate made to the budget package, it would go to Gov. Bill Richardson for his signature.

Senate Finance Chairman John Arthur Smith, D-Deming, said he expected the House to concur and he predicted the bill would be on Richardson's desk by the weekend. "We're hoping that he looks on this favorably," Smith said.

The session ends Feb. 14.

The bill, which was approved 36-4, provides for a spending increase of $349 million, or just over 6 percent, for the budget year that starts in July. That's in contrast to an 11 percent increase in the state budget passed a year ago.

The revenues "just flat are not there this year. ... We tried to take care of the areas of greatest concern," Smith told his Senate colleagues.

The Senate backed off on proposed cuts in legal staff at two state agencies that have irked some lawmakers by clamping down on oil and gas drilling practices and vehicle emissions.

While the Finance Committee initially included the cuts in the Senate version of the budget, they were restored before the panel sent the budget to the full Senate Wednesday for a vote.

The proposal was to whack nearly $500,000 from the budgets of the Environment Department and the Energy, Minerals and Natural Resources Department. Six lawyers from those agencies would have been transferred instead to the attorney general's office.

Richardson had complained the cuts looked like retaliation for the administration's tough rules to protect the environment.

Still in the budget bill: a provision aimed at forcing state employees to use the Rail Runner Express, the administration-created commuter rail system, for government travel.

The provision says workers couldn't get mileage reimbursement for travel in government vehicles between cities the Rail Runner serves.

Lawmakers had about $360 million in so-called new money to use this year on program expansions. About $125 million of that went to public schools and about $91 million to Medicaid, which pays for health care for the poor, for uninsured children and for some adults. Colleges and universities were increased by about $38 million, while the Corrections Department accounted for about $17 million of the new spending.

The Senate version of the budget spends about $2.2 million more than the House had approved.






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