New York’s budget bills total hundreds of pages of text — and basically don’t mean a heck of a lot.

All of the numbers in the budget are basically placeholder numbers. School districts, municipalities and other agencies that provide state services with state funding will be waiting to see if state revenues can sustain the spending. If it can’t, the state will be authorized to make quarterly cuts to the budget. The arrangement was first broached by Gov. Andrew Cuomo last week during one of his daily COVID-19 news briefings, but state budget bills put some meat on the skeletal outline Cuomo broached.

The all funds budget, according to Assemblywoman Crystal Peoples-Stokes, D-Buffalo, is $178 billion, with federal funding used to supplant what normally would have been state dollars. Peoples-Stokes said she expects spending to be substantially less in 2020-21 than it was in 2019-20, though it won’t be known until later this year just how much state funding will decrease.

According to the first several pages of the Aid to Localities budget bill, A.9530C/S7503C, state Budget Director Robert Mujica will determine if the budget is balanced during three measurement periods — April 1 to April 30, May 1 to June 30, and July 1 to Dec. 31. If the state’s General Fund is imbalanced during a measurement period, Mujica is given the ability to adjust or reduce any general fund or state special revenue fund as needed to bring the budget into balance.

The budget is considered unbalanced if operating funds tax receipts are less than 99% of projection or if actual state operating funds disbursements are more than 101% of projections, or both.

There are some categories exempted from adjustment:

¯ public assistance payments for families and individuals and payments for eligible aged, blind and disabled persons related to supplemental social security;

¯ any reductions that would violate federal law;

¯ payments of debt service and related expenses for which the state is constitutionally obligated to pay debt service or is contractually obligated to pay debt service, subject to an appropriation, including where the state has a contingent contractual obligation; and

¯ payments the state is obligated to make pursuant to court orders or judgments.

Prior to making any adjustments or reduction, the budget director must notify the chairs of the legislative fiscal committees in writing — and the Legislature has 10 days following receipt of that notice to prepare and approve its own plan.

If the state Legislature fails to approve its own plan, the budget director can go ahead and implement his own cuts.

The state transportation, economic development an d environmental conservation budget, A.9508/S.7508B, includes expedited siting of renewable energy facilities and transmission infrastructure, including creation of an Office of Renewable Energy Siting, as was introduced by Cuomo in a 30-day budget amendment in February. The Office of Renewable Energy Siting will have a year to establish a set of uniform standards and conditions for siting, design, construction and operation of each type of major renewable energy facility.

Municipalities will have the opportunity under the new law to submit a statement to the Office of Renewable Energy to give its opinion whether the facility is designed to be sited, constructed and operated in conjunction with local laws and regulations concerning the environment, public health or public safety. If the municipality says the facility can’t be sited safely, the Office of Renewable Energy will hold a non-adjudicatory hearing on the application in the municipality that raised the issue. Public comments that raise substantive or significant issues can also trigger a hearing.

Following the hearings, the Office of Renewable Energy will make a decision, with a final siting permit issued only if the office makes a finding that the proposed project, with site-specific standards and conditions, complies with applicable laws and regulations. The office is given the power to disregard, in whole or in part, any local law or ordinance if it decides that the local law is unreasonably burdensome in view of the Climate Leadership Community Protection Act’s renewable energy targets and the environmental benefits of the proposed facility. The one-year requirement for a final decision on a renewable energy project is included in the bill.

The budget also includes public financing for state political primary, general or special elections for governor, lieutenant governor, attorney general, state comptroller, state Senate or state Assembly.