After a day at the state Capitol one night last week, I sat down to watch some television. Thoughts of seeing the Mets infield vanished in the four seconds it took Suze Orman to capture viewers who were headed farther up the dial. Ms. Orman, of course, is host of an eponymous program on personal finance that features the curious trials of shopping-mad women. Credit cards are cut. Old clothing is discarded. Tears are shed.

On this particular night, the guest was much more interesting than spring training. Her special consumerist sin involved accumulating more than $40,000 in credit card debt largely from purchases at Kentucky Fried Chicken. Cheerful and trim, the young woman had been on the show before. She was back on this night to celebrate: Since her last appearance, the chicken debt had been trimmed by more than $5,000. Hooray.

A similar celebration took place among state lawmakers in Albany last week. With the April 1 budget deadline fast approaching, the Senate and Assembly have been holding public negotiations over the rival budget proposals they released last week. One group, the Joint Subcommittee on Transportation, reached early agreement on the use of a referendum to determine whether the state should borrow billions for roads and mass transit.

A Democrat from Westchester, Assemblyman Richard Brodsky, told reporters after the public hearing not to minimize the importance of the referendum. Upstate Republicans and downstate Democrats were coming together to fill a gap created by Governor Pataki’s budget, Mr. Brodsky said. Here was a triumph of political ecumenism. “This is very important,” Mr. Brodsky said. “We’re not going to let regional differences sink this bond act.”

Perhaps even more significant than the money, Mr. Brodsky said, was the fact that the borrowing would be conducted in the light of day. As chairman of the legislative committee that oversees public authorities, Mr. Brodsky has led the fight against borrowing by public entities. Because of this so-called backdoor borrowing, state debt has skyrocketed to $45.4 billion from $14.4 billion in 1990. Despite a statute that forbids borrowing without voter approval, more than 90% of this debt was assumed without it.

A recent study by the office of the state comptroller looked at the legislative impulse to borrow in New York. A chief finding of the report is that backdoor borrowing has increased dramatically in the four years since the enactment of a law intended to rein in runaway debt. Another goal of The Debt Reform Act of 2000 was to limit borrowing for capital works like roads and bridges.

According to the report, the state has borrowed $7.7 billion since passage of the debt reform bill without one resulting capital asset. The report also chides lawmakers for borrowing during surplus years from 1996 to 2001. Those surpluses could have been put toward existing debt, the report says. Instead, lawmakers borrowed even more during the period. The upshot: New York’s debt per capita today is $2,420, or more than two and one half times the national average.

This year is no different. Mr. Pataki has said repeatedly that legislative budgets are too expensive. Yet, according to an analysis by the Citizens Budget Commission, the governor’s executive budget would increase outstanding backdoor debt in New York by $1.4 billion this year to $39 billion from $37.6 billion last year. If voters approve an additional $2.9 billion in borrowing in a November referendum, overall debt will see an even bigger jump this year.

Passage of the bond act is by no means certain. Lawmakers who support it will likely get a boost this year because of the mayor’s race in New York City. Voters in and around the city tend to support transportation borrowing far more readily than upstate voters, and the increased turnout for that election could be the difference. Voters narrowly defeated a $3.8 billion bond act for transportation in 2000, one year before New York’s last mayoral election.

Legislators like Mr. Brodsky and Senator Thomas Libous, a Republican of Binghamton who chairs the Senate’s committee on transportation, say the bond act is necessary. They blame the governor for shortchanging transportation in his budget. Mr. Pataki, meanwhile, has not ruled out authorizing bond act legislation, saying last week that he had not yet seen the proposal. The Assembly has proposed $2.9 billion in borrowing. The Senate has not yet agreed on a figure.

Whatever compromise is reached is not likely to be characterized by restraint, said Charles Brecher, research director at the Citizens Budget Commission. “This is essentially a proposal to increase outstanding taxpayer debt at a time when it is already high and already growing under the governor’s plan,” Mr. Brecher said. “I don’t think what’s going to come out of this process is a very disciplined budget.”

But that was already evident. Following the public hearing at which Mr. Brodsky urged enthusiasm over the new transportation borrowing, one reporter asked Assemblyman David Gantt, a Democrat of Monroe who is chairman of the Assembly’s committee on transportation, whether voters could be expected to support more borrowing. “Do you want to cut up your credit cards?” Mr. Gantt asked rhetorically.

Paging Suze Orman.

Mr. McGuire is Albany correspondent for The New York Sun.