Published: July 03, 2009 08:30 am      

Barbour vetoes proposed OT changes for troopers

JACKSON — Gov. Haley Barbour has vetoed parts of Mississippi’s overall $6 billion budget, including two provisions in a bill dealing with overtime pay for state troopers.

Barbour said he doesn’t want to restrict the efficient management of the Department of Public Safety by mandating the way overtime and compensatory time are handled.

Barbour vetoed parts of several other budget bills lawmakers passed during a three-day special session that ended at midnight Tuesday. The new state fiscal year began Wednesday.

He struck down provisions in two bills that would pay for special legislative sessions by taking $500,000 from the sale of NASCAR vanity license plates. The money usually funds repairs at the Capitol, the Governor’s Mansion and the War Memorial Building.

He vetoed plans to take money from state reserves to give $7 million to community mental health centers and $100,000 to the Mississippi Technology Alliance.

Barbour said that early in the budget-writing process, he and top lawmakers had agreed to take no more than $95 million from the state’s rainy day fund, about one-fourth of the fund’s balance. He said the $7.1 million went beyond that agreement.

The governor also vetoed a plan to take $2 million from the Department of Finance and Administration to give to the Gaming Commission.

Because legislators are not in session, it was not immediately clear when they would get to consider trying to override Barbour’s veto. Doing so would take a two-thirds vote in the House and Senate. Barbour is in his sixth year as governor, and lawmakers have not yet overridden one of his vetoes.

The bills are Senate Bill 2041, House Bills 45 and 58 and Senate Bills 2046, 2048 and 2047.