The Senate unanimously passed a $69 billion budget this afternoon setting in motion negotiations with the House that is expected to sign off on its plan tomorrow.

The Senate’s plan uses about $3 billion in federal stimulus funds to plug most of a $3.2 billion budget deficit and spends about $1 billion more than the House does.

The plan also relies on more than $880 million in federal funds for Medicaid not yet approved by Congress and more than $400 million from the Seminole tribe in a gambling deal still in the works.

“It’s no doubt one of the most challenging assignments I’ve ever run into. I hazard to guess you all feel the same way,” said Senate budget chief J.D. Alexander, R-Lake Wales.

Alexander backed off a plan that could have shut down up to five state prisons and opened the private Blackwater prison built and to be operated by Boca Raton-based Geo Group. The revised plan would allow the Panhandle private prison to open without shutting down state prisons.

But the compromise orders corrections officials to pare back their costs by 5 percent in some areas or outsource some functions.

Also still on the table: a $23 million cut to the county clerks of court. Palm Beach County clerk Sharon Bock said that would amount to a $2.7 million cut to her office and force her to fire 100 employees on top of the 101 she laid off last year.

Alexander said that the clerk issue would be dealt with later in negotiations with the House but did not promise all of the money would be put back in.

Nearly half of the phone calls to the Palm Beach County courthouse will go unanswered and people could wait for up to four hours to get served in person under budget cuts slipped into the Senate budget with little warning last week, county clerk Sharon Bock warned in a letter to Senate President Jeff Atwater, R-North Palm Beach.a

“Access to justice has already been severely compromised in Palm Beach County,” Bock wrote. “Further cuts will cause court cases to languish without any foreseeable resolution.”

Senate budget chief J.D. Alexander cut the clerks’ budget $23 million statewide – a $2.7 million cut in Palm Beach County – in a last minute amendment filed less than an hour before his budget meeting began on Thursday.

The Senate is expected to vote on the budget tomorrow. Palm Beach County Democratic Sens. Dave Aronberg and Ted Deutch filed an amendment to restore the clerks’ $23 million Alexander cut using a complicated formula that bases their budgets on per-case costs.

Bock said she would stop offering walk-in service at courthouses in Belle Glade, Palm Beach Gardens and Delray Beach, forcing the downtown courthouse to handle another 324,000 customers if the cuts go through.

Bock axed 101 workers last year after taking a $7.1 million budget hit and said she will have to lay off another 100 under the current plan, a 23 percent reduction in staff.