Updated at 11:51 p.m. CDT May 5, 2005

DES MOINES — The state Senate continued to work through budget bills on Thursday, while fending off criticism from House leaders that the individual measures were exceeding targets set earlier in the week.

The Senate debated deep into the night Thursday, approving most of the pieces of a new state budget, but funding for the regents — who oversee the state universities — and other portions were delayed until Friday.

“They are spending above their own targets and we haven’t gotten to the big budgets yet,” said House Speaker Chris Rants, R-Sioux City.

Senate leaders accused Rants of being the lone holdout on a deal already struck.

That deal made in the Senate includes a $5.1 billion budget for fiscal 2006, a 7.5 percent increase in spending over this year and about $25 million more than the House proposal.

“I understand Speaker Rants’ need to do a little posturing for his caucus,” Senate Democratic Leader Michael Gronstal, of Council Bluffs. “Now is the time to lay down our partisanship and seek common ground.”

Gronstal said the Senate would finish the final pieces of a new budget by Friday, and begin bargaining with House leaders on Monday.

“We will not take a vacation this week. We will not take a break,” Gronstal said. ” We intend to be here ready to work with the Republican majority in the House.”

Meanwhile, the Senate had yet another marathon day approving the various pieces of that new spending plan. Working into the night, the Senate agreed to double the state’s 36-cents per pack cigarette tax, dumping the $65 million that would generate into lowering property taxes.

The Senate also voted a double-digit pay increase for elected officials, and faced debate on other big spending issues.

There were complaints already flowing in as the Senate tackled individual budget items.

Michael Gartner, the new president of the state’s Board of Regents, noted that the Senate had increased spending on the state’s regent institutions by only $22 million.

That will force the state’s three universities to boost tuition by an additional 3 percent, he said in a statement.

The regents had expected a $40 million increase in exchange for $20 million in savings and an agreement to hold tuition increases below the rate of inflation.

“That gap must be filled,” Gartner said. “We will dig into our own resources, but we also now are forced to turn to Iowa’s parents and students for further help.”

Gronstal said there was little lawmakers could do with the Senate evenly split between Republicans and Democrats.

“Are we completely happy with the compromises we’ve gotten? The answer is clearly no,” said Gronstal. “If we had it to do ourselves would we come up with more resources for the regents? You betcha.”

Senate Republican President Jeff Lamberti, of Ankeny, said the Regents are getting a significant increase and he had a warning of his own.

“I think at some point in time this Legislature is going to talk about the need to control the rise in tuition,” Lamberti said. “They apparently can’t.”

The Senate also has approved a $43 million measure providing for pay hikes bargained by state workers, and that measure includes a 17 percent pay hike for themselves. Other elected officials got double-digit increases and the governor’s new salary would be $130,000.