BOSTON — House Speaker Ron Mariano suggested Thursday that broad budget cuts could be on the table when lawmakers sit down next year to draft the fiscal year 2026 budget, painting a grim financial picture for Massachusetts fueled by the historically high cost of running state-run shelters.

An influx of migrants from other countries and the crushing costs of living in Massachusetts have pushed people to seek assistance from emergency shelters at record levels. The state is required to run the shelter program because of a decades-old right-to-shelter law.

But with an expected $932 million tab this fiscal year and $915 million in the next to maintain shelters, associated services, and keep municipal reimbursements on track, Mariano projected that a range of other programs could be on the chopping block.

“Every program that we fund is susceptible to being tapped to fund the shelter program. Not in this budget but in the next because there will be no help coming. There’s no help coming. The federal government can’t get its act together,” he told reporters. “They couldn’t even agree on a vote to shut down the border.”

Emergency shelters in Massachusetts have remained at a 7,500-family cap Gov. Maura Healey imposed in the fall. Legislative budget writers said this month that it costs the state roughly $75 million a month to care for those families with children and pregnant people temporarily living in a sweeping network of hotels, motels, and traditional shelter sites.

The exorbitant cost of the system has started to weigh heavily on Beacon Hill amid a consistent return of lower-than-expected tax revenues. The House, Senate, and Healey have proposed limiting families’ stays at shelters and overflow sites in an attempt to curb demand and costs.

“If we keep getting a billion-dollar bill for emergency shelters, where are we going to get the money?” Mariano said. “There has to be some realities that people put forth so that there’s some understanding that cuts will have to come. And it’s not something that I look forward to and I’m not going to spring it on people at the last minute and say hey, ‘we just whacked your budget.’ People have to understand how we get to this.”

Budget writers expect to run out of money to pay for the emergency assistance shelter program this fiscal year in early to mid-April, and two top Democrats are hashing out a plan to pay for services for the rest of the fiscal year and potentially into the next.

Questions about fiscal year 2026 have been lingering in the hallways of the State House, especially if demand for emergency shelters does not slow down.

Mariano said Beacon Hill will manage to fund services in fiscal years 2024 and 2025 because of surplus revenues left over from the pandemic.

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