Wolf mum for now on fate of budget bill on his desk

The following is a line-item breakdown of the budget the governor enacted on Tuesday which is reflected in the column on the far right.

At a Capitol news conference, Wolf said Republican lawmakers who “ran out of town” off for the year-end holidays needed to “get back to the work of the people”.

Wolf’s Budget Secretary Randy Albright said the $700 million that the governor vetoed including a half year’s budget for the Department of Corrections and medical assistance as well as all funding for “pet projects lawmakers inserted in the budget”.

The governor said he is disappointed in GOP lawmakers: “In doing this, I’m expressing the outrage that all of us should feel about the garbage the Republican legislative leaders have tried to dump on us”.

Schools and agencies affected by Pennsylvania’s six-month long budget impasse should finally start getting some of the cash owed to them by the state. The Philadelphia-based Education Law Center asked Wolf to veto the budget bill. And we’ll see huge increases in local taxes and massive additional cuts to our local schools.

Republican leaders scaled down that plan last week after a bill to reduce state pension costs stalled in the GOP-controlled House. The legislature left for vacation without passing appropriations bills for state-related universities, Penn State, University of Pittsburgh, Lincoln University, Temple University, and the Penn School of Veterinary Science, and other “non-preferred” institutions.

“This means that their budget is an effective $95 million cut to school districts after years of cuts under previous Republican budgets”.

Accusing Republican House Leaders of running out before the job was finished, the governor added that he doesn’t “have the power” to bring them back to the table, calling on citizens to hold their representatives accountable.

“When Tom Wolf issued a complete veto of the Republicans’ on-time budget last June, he needlessly plunged our school districts and non-profits into a six-month crisis”.

“This budget they gave me doesn’t balance”, he said.

Wolf did agree to release almost 24 billion dollars in what he called “emergency spending” to keep schools and emergency management agencies open. I get it that everyone is exhausted of this stalemate. It contains about $500 million more than the bill Wolf rejected Tuesday and calls for a 6 percent spending increase and $1 billion-plus in new taxes.

Pennsylvania’s Democratic governor is about to announce his plans for a Republican-passed spending plan he could sign, reject or whittle down.