With just over a week to go before the new budget year begins April 1, one big question is how much damage Gov. Kathy Hochul and legislative leaders will do to the state’s fiscal future.

Awash in cash from DC and last year’s massive state tax hike, Hochul proposed shelling out a whopping $216 billion for the new year. Yet lawmakers make her look like a piker: The Assembly calls for spending $226.4 billion, up a stunning $53 billion, or 31%, from just three years ago.

Assembly Dems want billions (on top of Hochul’s outlays) for child care, universal pre-K, tuition assistance and other goodies. The Senate, too, would hemorrhage cash: $250 million for pre-K, millions more for higher ed, $278 million to expand home-care eligibility . . .

Both chambers aim to boost minimum wages for home-care workers to $22.50 from $13.20, at a cost of as much as $2.5 billion a year. Lawmakers even set aside millions for longer inmate phone calls and to extend the state Earned Income Tax Credit to people who lack Social Security numbers (illegal immigrants, that is). The parties were reportedly still at least $9 billion apart over the weekend.

Meanwhile, despite their newfound cash, they did virtually zilch to ease New Yorkers’ tax burden, the nation’s heaviest. Likewise, despite the struggle of restaurant and bar owners to recover from lockdowns, the Legislature omits provisions to let them sell booze to go (much to the liquor-store lobby’s delight, no doubt).

Nor did any of them initially seek fixes in the state’s disastrous criminal-justice laws, though Hochul is now pushing for at least some tweaks.

The huge spending hikes “will create more risk that we will run into problems down the road,” warns the Empire Center’s Peter Warren. New outlays are “not federally funded and, if established, will quickly become a major drain on the operating budget,” echoes New York City Partnership boss Kathy Wylde.

And Hochul may make matters even worse, by calling for another $1 billion for a new stadium for the Buffalo Bills, a private business.

Outrageously, lawmakers also fail to renew mayoral control of city schools — a nod to teachers unions, which fear that Mayor Eric Adams might put kids ahead of teachers.

No, the gov isn’t going to lower her recklessly high opening bid for budget talks, but she shouldn’t approve one dime more demanded by lawmakers. Nor should she agree to any deal that doesn’t fully fix the state’s disastrous criminal-justice laws or renew mayoral control. And if she and lawmakers can’t reach a responsible deal by April 1, let them keep talking: Better no deal than one that destroys the state.