There are only so many ways to bring an out-of-balance budget into balance: Raise more money, spend less money or a combination of the two.

Or, in the case of the state government, one can also shuffle money from one pot to another to cover the most essential programs.

Rather than raise money through taxes and fees in an election year, Maryland Gov. Wes Moore and his team are relying on a combination of spending cuts, expense reductions and money shifts to propose a balanced $70.8 billion budget.

All told, Moore is recommending about $1.8 billion in cuts and other maneuvers to close a $1.4 billion shortfall for the next fiscal year.

“We know the numbers and Maryland is going to be forced to do more with less,” the Democratic governor said as he unveiled his budget Wednesday.

Moore’s acting budget secretary, Jake Weissmann, said the process involved “making difficult decisions about what sort of increases were feasible or where costs could be shared with local government.”

Here are the biggest components of the budget-balancing equation.

• $322 million: Money being transferred from the capital budget (which pays for building things) to the operating budget (which pays for salaries and programs).
• $292 million: Money being moved out of the Strategic Energy Investment Fund, which pays for clean energy projects, and into the general fund.
• $187 million: When taxes on capital gains come in higher than projected, the state moves them to an account called the Fiscal Responsibility Fund. This is where Moore found money to help SNAP recipients during the federal government shutdown, and he’s tapping it again for the general budget.
• $150 million: When the comptroller collects income taxes, a portion is routed to the state and another portion is sent to local governments. The Local Income Tax Reserve, which the local portion goes through, has extra money in it that will be moved to the state’s general fund.
• $150 million: Cuts to the Developmental Disabilities Administration.
• $145 million: Transferring money out of the Rainy Day Fund and into the general fund.
• $120 million: Not increasing state employee pay as much as expected.
• $79 million: Not increasing payments to service providers in programs run by the state departments of health, human services and education.
• $39 million: Shifting more of the costs for retirement programs for teachers, librarians and community college workers to county governments.
• Other cuts: The budget contains scores of smaller cuts and foregone spending increases, some as small as a few thousand dollars.

The budget proposal now heads to the General Assembly, where lawmakers will dissect it and make their own changes — first in the Senate, then in the House of Delegates. A final version must be agreed to by the end of the General Assembly session in April.

The budget, once finalized, will govern state spending from July 1, 2026, through June 30, 2027.