Wolf will sign, line-item veto Pa. budget

Governor Tom Wolf us expected to announce Tuesday what he’ll do with the budget bill on his desk.

Wolf said he got to a point where he did not want to “hold the children of Pennsylvania hostage” while the stalemate continues.

“The Republican budget underfunds education and uses gimmicks that will actually lead to a $95 million cut in funding for our schools”, said John Hanger, secretary of policy and planning in the governor’s office, in a news release. “This budget is wrong for Pennsylvania, and the legislature, the folks we elected to serve us, need to own up to this”. It resembles a GOP budget plan that Wolf vetoed June 30 and won the votes of just two Democrats. That bill calls for a 6 percent spending increase and $1 billion-plus in unspecified new taxes.

Members of legislative leadership reported no progress over the weekend in efforts to revive a bipartisan compromise budget after it stalled last week.

It contains about $500 million less than the package that Wolf had supported, would carry a smaller tax increase to prop it up and sends substantially less aid to public schools and social services than what Wolf had sought. “I think that was something we need to do”.

The details of the proposed tax hikes to accompany the spending plan were never put into legislation or publicly disclosed.

No funding is provided to Penn State, Pitt, Temple and Lincoln universities or to the University of Pennsylvania vet school. Republicans continue to refuse to adequately fund Pre-K through 12 education and their budget fails to fund $305 million in school construction reimbursements.

The House GOP’s budget bill perpetuates what some call a decade of cuts to social services, squeezing programs and the wages of people who care for the elderly and disabled.

Governor Wolf vetoed parts of the budget because Republicans did not pay for their spending and to ensure a more responsible budget, but he is taking action to ensure that schools receive money owed to them through December 31.

“Late this afternoon, the Senate passed a compromise budget that could finally bring an end to the state budget impasse”, Causer wrote.

But that proposal hit a wall in the House when the chamber overwhelmingly defeated the pension proposal.