This report explains that the General Fund budget: provides $1,232.6 million for the FY 2003-05 biennium; slashes student financial aid funding by 8.6 percent; includes a reduction of 3 percent for Early Retirement Incentive Plan salary savings; represents a budget that is 16.5 percent below requested current services funding, $15.8 million below the Governor's recommendation for FY 2004 and $20.3 million below the Appropriations Committee's recommendation; and reverses the Governor's proposed transfer of the Connecticut State University (CSU) and Community-Technical College System (CTC) central offices into the Department of Higher Education (DHE) to form a Board of Regents but maintains the requirement for most of the estimated consolidation savings of $2.8 million in FY 2004 and $5.8 million in FY 2005. The final budget for the DHE reverses the transfer of one-half of the CSU and CTC central office positions along with the additional savings of 25 percent in FY 2004 and 50 percent in FY 2005. Funding for the University of Connecticut and UConn Health Center is slightly lower than previous legislation recommendations, while funding for the CTC is slightly higher than previously proposed. The budget for Charter Oak State College eliminated the restoration of the collective bargaining funding with the settlement of the contract and the $200,000 of growth funding for the Connecticut Distance Learning Consortium. (SM)