SALTER – Tobacco fund heads to total depletion

Tobacco fund heads to total depletion

W hen Gov. Haley Barbour took office there was about $630 million in the state’s supposedly “inviolate” Health Care Trust Fund – the repository of the state’s tobacco settlement.

If Barbour’s Fiscal Year 2012 budget recommendation is adopted by the Legislature, the fund will contain about $50 million when Barbour vacates the Governor’s Mansion. Joint Legislative Budget Committee numbers show a current unobligated balance in the fund of $102.5 million.

Sid Salter
11/21/10