June will not be pleasant for Ohio lawmakers. They'll have to spend the month either slashing services that Ohioans hold dear, raising taxes or both.

Not pleasant, but unavoidable. The state constitution requires a balanced budget by June 30, and at present, projected state revenues for the 2010-11 biennium fall far short -- some say the gap could reach $3 billion -- of the spending proposed in the current version of the budget, which was passed by the House of Representatives in April.

The Senate version is expected to be introduced today or Friday. Republicans who control the Senate have said they plan to trim $1 billion from the $54 billion House measure and will leave the rest of the cuts to a joint House-Senate conference committee.

That's appropriate; the Democrat-controlled House helped create this out-of-balance chaos and its members should share in the hard work of fixing it.

This is the responsibility lawmakers asked for when they campaigned for the state legislature; now is the time to deliver.

Responsible lawmakers could find a silver lining in this gloomy task: The stunning size of the looming deficit could give them cover to do the right thing and make some changes that are essential but will be unpopular with somebody.

First up should be ending the legislature's dogged loyalty to the nursing-home industry. For years, both chambers and both parties have put the interests of this deep-pocketed industry ahead of those of elderly Ohioans, by putting a disproportionate amount of the state's Medicaid funds for long-term care into nursing homes instead of in-home care and assisted living, options that many seniors prefer and that cost less.

Even though the last three governors have championed changes, thanks to legislative foot-dragging, Ohio still spends a far greater-than-average percentage of its long-term care dollars on nursing homes.

The unprecedented budget gap facing the state should make it easier for lawmakers to end the inappropriate favoritism, even at the cost of disappointing their nursing-home friends.

The crisis also offers justification for Strickland and Democratic supporters in the House to retool the governor's education plan, which calls for substantial spending increases over 10 years to hire more teachers, tutors and counselors and launch new programs but gives no indication of where the money will come from.

That vagueness would be reason for pause under any circumstances; with a fiscal crisis looming, the plan is detached from reality.

Hard as it will be to cut as much as $3 billion to balance the 2010-11 budget, the legislature should be mindful that more than $5 billion of the money to be spent in the next biennium will come from one-time sources, including the federal stimulus package. That means that, when lawmakers are writing the 2012-13 budget, if they try to maintain all programs, they'll be $5 billion in the hole from the start. Prudent leaders would confront that problem now, rather than later.

The state's leaders don't want to raise taxes or make any more cuts than absolutely necessary this year, apparently worried about the effect these would have on their re-election chances in 2010.

But putting the problem off until after those elections will make necessary adjustments far more painful.