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Senators snipped millions of dollars off the state budget Thursday in light of a lower revenue forecast, but not before restoring funding for preschool, environment and public safety initiatives that the House had cut in the draft it passed earlier this month.

The savings would help Hawaii retain a positive ending balance for the next few years, but financial projections show the state would still enter deficit-spending mode by 2017.

While Democrats touted the changes they made to the budget, the Senate’s lone Republican voiced his reservations.

“I must state my disappointment that we are not reducing government expenditures significantly,” Sen. Sam Slom told his colleagues on the Ways and Means Committee before they voted to advance the budget bill to the full Senate.

“I don’t think we’re being honest in terms of the real severity facing us,” he said.

The Hawaii Council on Revenues on March 11 downgraded its revenue forecast for the state from 3.3 percent growth this fiscal year to zero and from 7.4 percent in 2015 to 5.5 percent. These forecasts leave Hawaii with almost half a billion dollars less than it expected to have for the current biennium.

The record $844 million carryover balance the state started the year with has quickly evaporated as officials lean on it to balance the budget.

In December, Gov. Neil Abercrombie requested just over $53 million in cuts to the budget for fiscal 2014 due to the economy not growing as fast as expected and proposed adding $183 million in general fund spending for 2015. By the Senate’s tally, additional spending proposals for next year have boosted the governor’s overall 2015 request up to $200 million.

The Ways and Means Committee, chaired by Sen. David Ige, trimmed $45 million from the operating budget for the current fiscal year, which ends June 30. That’s on top of $53 million the House cut this month before passing the budget bill to the Senate.

For 2015, the committee lopped off $158 million in general fund spending, leaving a modest $41 million increase for next year.

Under the Senate’s plan, the fiscal 2014 general fund budget would be $5.94 billion, rising to $6.16 billion in 2015.

The Big Winner in the Senate Budget: Education

Senators added $3 million to the budget for the Department of Human Services’ Preschool Open Doors program and gave $5.7 million to the Office of Early Learning for pilot projects.

The move is expected to give 2,700 kids — roughly two-thirds of those who were born too late to make the new kindergarten enrollment cutoff — access to some form of preschool.

The House had cut the $2.5 million that Abercrombie wanted for the Preschool Open Doors program, which would have helped some 1,200 kids.

The $3 million that Ways and Means put in the budget would serve an estimated 1,600 children, Ige told reporters at a budget presentation Thursday afternoon.

Ige is running against the governor in the August 9 primary for the Democratic gubernatorial nomination.

Education is one of Abercrombie’s long-standing priorities. Last year he called on lawmakers to start a preschool program that would serve all 4-year-olds in Hawaii, a plan they partially funded.

Ige, who has built a reputation for fiscal restraint, recently secured the Hawaii State Teachers Association’s endorsement. It was a , who the teachers’ union backed in 2010.

“I do believe in early learning,” Ige said. “I believe the earlier you have a structured environment where children can learn, the better off we are.”

Sen. Jill Tokuda, who chairs the Education Committee, embraced the Senate budget’s support for education. The budget includes an additional $15 million in discretionary spending for principals to use at their schools, $2 million for the Strive HI school performance improvement system and $2 million for student athletics.

The Senate’s capital improvement budget added $625 million for projects at the University of Hawaii and $638 million for the Department of Education.

Ige said that without a doubt, education was the big winner in the Senate version of the budget, receiving the “lion’s share” of the increases in appropriations.

Priority: Public Safety

Education aside, senators decided to give the Department of Public Safety $2 million in discretionary money to use for programs such as the Justice Reinvestment Initiative, part of Abercrombie’s plan. The House had cut $800,000 from a budding JRI program — county victim services — which includes counselors and clerks.

The Senate also gave the department $786,000 for mental health care positions and $519,000 for suicide hospital watch positions.

Public Safety Director Ted Sakai, who oversees the prison system in Hawaii, declared a “crisis on our hands” last May after three inmates died in two months. He’s been lobbying the Legislature for more funding and positions to combat the issue.

The House had cut $53 million from the department’s budget for 2015 because of the lower revenue forecast.

On the environmental front, the Senate budget adds $1.5 million for the Department of Land and Natural Resources to enforce rules and $2.15 million for watershed programs.

Ige cautioned that the Senate budget bill does not include funding for certain administration requests that are intended to be funded under other appropriation measures, including joint majority package bills.

Of the $158 million in supposed savings, $33.5 million is slated for salary increases for members of the University of Hawaii professors’ union, $1 million for the Hawaii Invasive Species Council and $4.9 million for Kupuna Care and other senior citizen programs.

Ige said the Senate wants to finish its version of the budget as soon as possible so negotiators from both chambers can work with the administration to hash out a final spending plan.

The state budget legislation, which is , is headed to a vote before the full Senate. From there, a conference committee will iron out a final draft for the Legislature to approve by May.

The Executive Office on Early Learning receives in-kind support from The Omidyar Group and Collaborative Leaders Network as well as grants from the Hawaii Community Foundation via the Omidyar Ohana Fund. Pierre Omidyar is the CEO and publisher of Civil Beat.

• Contact Nathan Eagle via email at neagle@civilbeat.com or Twitter at .