Senators also pointed out that Perry's proposed $110 billion, two-year budget contains no money for state employee pay raises, including new raises for prison officers.

Perry's budget contains no tax increase and would leave $200 million for other spending. However, it also leaves no money to help state teachers get health insurance or to make Medicaid health insurance more accessible for Texas' poorest families.

Perry's staffers explained that the governor thinks more prison capacity will be needed by 2004-05, when the new units would be opened.

The governor's proposed prison projects involve 1,000 more beds for inmates who need to be segregated from the general prison population because of the danger they pose. Also, it calls for 800 more beds for "geriatric" inmates.

Earlier, the director of financial services for the Texas Department of Criminal Justice did not list new prison construction to the committee as among the agency's five top spending priorities.