Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid announced a deal on economic stimulus legislation Wednesday, although House Speaker Nancy Pelosi was unhappy about the amount of education funding in the plan.

“We’re hopeful we can move the bill. We’ll see what the Senate does,’’ said House Majority Leader Steny H. Hoyer , who confirmed that a deal had been reached on the conference report.

He said the details would be announced by House Appropriations Chairman David R. Obey , D-Wis., and Senate Appropriations Chairman Daniel K. Inouye , D-Hawaii, after a formal session of House-Senate conferees was concluded.

The formal conference adjourned in the early evening Wednesday, subject to the call of the chair, without formal agreement. But lawmakers were circulating the conference agreement Wednesday night with the expectation they will have enough to approve the agreement by Thursday morning.

Emerging from a hastily called House Democratic caucus meeting Wednesday evening, Pelosi said that House Democratic negotiators had held up agreement with the Senate and the White House during the afternoon to ensure that money for school repairs remained a priority in the stimulus package.

She said the concerns stemmed from the Senate’s decision to remove such school funding as a separate item in the package. Instead, the Senate rolled the money into a “state stabilization fund” in which state governments can use money for a variety of purposes.

“I would like it to be it’s own item. But we’re very happy,” she said. “I’m not worried.”

Pelosi, who said the caucus meeting was “very spirited,” stressed that almost all the spending in the final bill is not permanent. Rather, she said, the money is designed to pump up the economy in the short-term.

“A very small percentage of the bill would increase the baseline. The overwhelming majority will not because fiscal responsibility is very important. I want to dispel any thought that this was a new baseline,” she said.

Negotiators Agree on Topline

Negotiators from the House, Senate and White House agreed that the final economic stimulus bill (HR 1) will cost $789.5 billion, according to Senate leaders.

Democratic congressional leaders and President Obama have pushed for quick action by the conference committee, and they hammered out a compromise that would aid states, provide tax cuts and spend hundreds of billions of dollars to pump up the ailing economy.

“Like any negotiation, this involved give and take, and if you don’t mind me saying so, that’s an understatement,” said Reid, D-Nev.

Harkin said Senate leaders should have let them filibuster or vote against the final bill and “see what the public outcry is if they vote against this.”

School Funding, Tax Breaks, Medicaid

School construction funding — included in the House bill but not the Senate version — was a major bone of contention. By late afternoon, it appeared that the final bill would not specifically fund school construction but would allow states to use some of the “stabilization” money provided under the bill for school projects.

Collins and centrist Democratic Sen. Ben Nelson of Nebraska said the compromise would provide $54 billion for the state stabilization fund, up from $39 billion in the Senate substitute. The House bill had provided $79 billion for the fund.

The House bill had allocated $14 billion for kindergarten-12th grade school construction, while the Senate substitute included no funds.

Nelson said negotiators intended the money to go for school modernization. “Modernization,” he said. “New school construction will not be in the bill.”

The final version also reportedly includes $11.5 billion in special education funding and $10 billion in federal aid for schools with sizable numbers of disadvantaged students.

Harkin objected to including a one-year “patch” in the package to keep the alternative minimum tax from reaching millions more Americans in the 2009 tax year, “which we were going to do later this year anyway in a tax bill.”

The conference committee was likely to trim Obama’s signature “Making Work Pay” tax credit from $500 per individual and $1,000 per couple to $400 and $800, respectively. That would reduce the cost of the bill but would also limit one of the provisions that economists agree would be most likely to stimulate the economy. The income phaseout was the same as in the House bill — starting at $75,000 for individuals and $150,000 for couples — said Ways and Means Chairman Charles B. Rangel , D-N.Y., so that more people could get the credit than under the Senate bill, even if the amount is smaller.

The compromise retained a new tax deduction for the purchase of a new car in the year ahead, along with an enhanced tax credit for purchase of a home. The final amounts of both were still being resolved, however.

Negotiators split the difference on a formula for allocating a Medicaid funding increase to states. Sixty-five percent of the funding would be doled out on an across-the-board, flat rate basis, while 35 percent would be distributed based on increases in unemployment, according to House Commerce Committee Chairman Henry A. Waxman , D-Calif.

The House had used a 50-50 formula, while the Senate preferred an 80-20 split.

Collins called the new top line “a fiscally responsible number that reflects our efforts to truly focus this bill on programs and policies and tax relief that will help turn our economy around, create jobs and provide relief to the families of our country.”

She also said negotiators had increased spending for infrastructure to a total of $150 billion, including money to promote broadband access nationwide.

GOP Protests

Meanwhile, House Minority Leader John A. Boehner , R-Ohio, blasted Democrats for not including House GOP representatives in meaningful negotiations on the stimulus package.

“They’ve been working in secret,” he said, after House and Senate Democratic negotiators met late into the night, at times with Republican senators, to discuss possible compromises on the massive package.

But since House GOP votes aren’t needed for final passage, the minority in the lower chamber has been excluded. Not a single House Republican supported the bill when the House passed it by 244-188 on Jan. 28.

“This is not what the American people want. Why not allow our members to sit in the conference?” he asked.

Boehner also challenged the Democratic negotiators to post the eventual conference report online for 48 hours before the House is asked to vote on it. The House voted unanimously Tuesday on a motion to instruct conferees to do just that.

Members of the Congressional Black Caucus, meanwhile, urged House leaders in a letter to retain the chamber’s original provisions in five areas: the proposed Neighborhood Stabilization Fund; workforce training and employment initiatives; school construction; broadband Internet infrastructure; and language intended to ensure that small, minority, and disadvantaged businesses have access in the bidding process for projects under the bill.

Paul M. Krawzak, Lydia Gensheimer, Joseph J. Schatz, David Clarke, Kathleen Hunter and Edward Epstein contributed to this story.