(Columbia-AP) June 5, 2003 - Legislators wanted to come back to Columbia on June 17th to deal with Governor Mark Sanford's budget vetoes. But that may not happen now. Sanford has until noon on Monday to send any changes to lawmakers.

The Senate on Wednesday afternoon could not muster the two-thirds vote needed for a resolution to come back to their desks. A 23-20 vote broke along party lines.

Senators hope to have a chance to take up the resolution Thursday before mandatory adjournment at 5:00pm. If senators don't pass the resolution, they would have to wait until January to deal with budget vetoes or hope that Sanford calls a special session for it.

The House and Senate on Tuesday passed a $5.3 billion spending plan for the fiscal year that begins July 1st. The governor expects to use his entire allotted time to go over the budget, "You've got $5 billion of spending. We're going through it with a fine tooth comb. I think we'll burn the whole five days looking at it."

Medicaid was largely spared in the spending plan, but public school and college spending was cut and most state agencies will have fewer dollars to spend.

An extended legislative session would cost taxpayers at least $25,000 a day at a time in which state agencies are still trying to cut almost nine percent from their budgets to wrap up the current fiscal year.

updated 9:33am by Chris Rees