HARRISBURG -- A month ago, the state Senate approved a bare-bones $27.3 billion budget proposal for fiscal 2009-10, with all 30 Republicans voting yes and all 20 Democrats voting no.

Yesterday, 20 Democrats on the House Appropriations Committee voted to reject the GOP budget proposal and 14 Republicans voted in favor of it, putting the state budget process basically back to square one.

Democrats said Senate Bill 850 cut too many important programs, such as pre-kindergarten classes, economic development, state parks, child care for working parents, state aid to nursing homes, hospitals, people with disabilities and libraries.

"Senate Bill 850 stinks and it needs to be thrown out with the garbage, and then we can start over," Rep. John Myers, D-Philadelphia, said bluntly. He also criticized what he called "the Rush Limbaugh mentality about no tax increases."

The Senate-adopted budget "was a partisan political document [that] failed to meet the public interest," said Chuck Ardo, an aide to Democratic Gov. Ed Rendell. "We look forward to seeing a more realistic approach" as state budget talks go on.

Senate Republicans had rejected the $29 billion budget proposal that Mr. Rendell made in February. It called for higher tobacco taxes, a new tax on natural gas extracted from Marcellus shale areas, and use of about half of the state's $750 million Rainy Day Fund, which is set aside for economic emergencies.

"If it's not raining right now in Pennsylvania, then I don't know what it feels like to be wet," said Rep. Jake Wheatley, D-Hill District.

Rep. Dan Frankel, D-Squirrel Hill, said the Senate budget would penalize counties, municipalities and school boards by not increasing their state funding. That, in turn, would force local governments to increase property taxes on their residents, he said.

But Erik Arneson, a Senate GOP spokesman, said the $29 billion Rendell budget is now way out of balance. When it was released in February, the state budget deficit was $2.3 billion, but that has now grown to at least $3 billion.

Nonetheless, the House Appropriations Chairman Rep. Dwight Evans, D-Philadelphia, said the Rendell budget plan will now be the legislative "vehicle" for creating a state budget for the fiscal year that starts July 1.

Asked if the four legislative caucuses can resolve major differences with Mr. Rendell over spending and taxing, House Appropriations Chairman Rep. Dwight Evans, D-Philadelphia, said, "Anything is possible, but we have to work hard. We have to work collectively. There has to be a compromise.''

Mr. Rendell will soon recommend up to $500 million in additional spending cuts for 2009-10, which Mr. Evans said will be considered as budget talks move forward.