With the start of a new fiscal year less than a week away, Gov. Ed Rendell has proposed $500 million more in budget cuts in an effort to get his budget through the state Legislature.

The cuts would bring the budget's grand total to $28.8 billion, counting $2.4 billion in federal stimulus money.

That puts the difference between the governor's proposal and the $27.3 billion spending plan approved by the state Senate in May at about $1.5 billion.

However, the meaningful difference may be closer to $900,000 because the Senate plan does not include some costs that arose later, such as $421 million in mandatory expenses identified by the state Office of the Budget and $200 million in additional state income tax refunds.

"Like so many of the cutbacks that we have made before, these reductions are painful to me, and I understand they will be painful to the people who benefit from the affected programs. But the reductions are necessary," the governor said.

The governor still is hoping to use money from the federal economic stimulus to help increase the basic education subsidy by $418 million, using a formula initiated in 2008-09 and aimed at distributing money more fairly. In addition, he is proposing $285 million in one-time grants to school districts to help them close budget shortfalls and make one-time investments.

He also wants to use the stabilization money to help preserve funding for the 14 universities in the State System of Higher Education, which includes Slippery Rock, California, Indiana, Clarion and Edinboro, as well as for the state's 14 community colleges and the Thaddeus Stevens College of Technology.

Yesterday, the state filed its formal application for the federal State Fiscal Stabilization Fund, which is expected to provide as much as $1.9 billion -- about $1.6 billion for education and the rest for public safety -- for Pennsylvania over about two years. This is part of the money available in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act.

Senate Republicans voted earlier to roll back education spending to 2006 levels and fill the gap with money from the stabilization fund, resulting in a no-increase allocation for school districts. Mr. Rendell recently solicited a letter in support from U.S. Education Secretary Arne Duncan, urging legislators not to follow the Senate plan.

The governor's proposed cuts cover 229 line items. Counting reductions in his earlier budget proposal, 163 line items have been eliminated and 328 reduced. The latest plan accepts about half of the cuts proposed in the Senate bill, according to the governor.

The latest cuts include:

• A new reduction of 13 percent in support for state-related universities: Penn State, University of Pittsburgh, Temple and Lincoln.

• Reduction in Pennsylvania Higher Education Assistance Agency spending, including $45 million in grants to students and $7.5 million in institutional assistance grants to independent universities.

• Elimination of all funding ($22 million) for Classrooms for the Future, a program which provides high-tech equipment and training to school districts.

• Elimination of state money for all museums, including Carnegie Museum of Natural History and Carnegie Science Center.

• Reduction of customized job training money by $9 million.

• Reduction of proposed funding for mental health services by $8.6 million.

• Removal of $7.5 million from the public library subsidy.

Although the new fiscal year for the state begins July 1, it's not unusual for the Legislature to approve a budget weeks, or in some years months, late.

The unresolved state budget has left school districts -- most of whom are required to pass their budgets by June 30 -- in a state of uncertainty.

The Pennsylvania School Funding Campaign yesterday conducted a news conference to emphasize the difficulty school boards have had setting property tax rates.

Some have passed budgets based on the governor's proposed increase in basic education subsidy but are restricting spending until the outcome is known.

Jay Himes, executive director of the Pennsylvania Association of School Business Officials, said given the difficult economy and the budget dispute, "I think this year is unprecedented in terms of the complexity of developing and approving school budgets."