All sides wait and watch as Pa. budget deadline looms
MEDIA » Don’t be surprised if, by Friday, lawmakers in Harrisburg haven’t passed a budget by the June 30 deadline.
Fiscal year 2017-18 begins July 1, but recent history has shown an inability for the Legislature and governor to agree upon a spending plan that relies on funds beyond the yearly “Band-Aids” that address a persistent $3 billion deficit.
Furthering the disparity between parties — Republicans have called for liquor privatization and expanded casino revenue, while Democrats have called for excise taxes on Marcellus Shale drilling — the rift has only widened between the GOPmajority Legislature and Democratic Gov. Tom Wolf, who allowed the 2015-16 budget to pass without his signature following a ninemonth statemate.
For the legislators scrambling around committee meetings and chamber negotiations this week in Harrisburg, the hectic nature that once epitomized the week leading up to the budget deadline has faded in lieu of a more patient approach, said Rep. Steve Barrar, R-160 of Upper Chichester, on Wednesday evening.
“It looks like we’ll be here through the long weekend. We haven’t yet come to an agreement,” Barrar said over the phone from Harrisburg. The House sent the Senate a budget bill in April of $31.5 billion for the 201718 fiscal year, with cuts to human services and criminal justice programs.
“We’re all hoping the economy improves so we can start to produce more state revenue; it’s stagnant, no growth,” Barrar said. “The governor doesn’t support broad-based taxes, so we have to look elsewhere for revenue.”
Barrar also said the uniformity clause in the Pennsylvania Constitution is highly unlikely to change, and with proposed increases to education, the $815 million gap between the $31.5 Republican House budget and Wolf’s initial target, and a reluctance of taxpayers to share a heavy burden with increased taxes, therein lies the philosophical impasse between parties in the Legislature.
Often the issue in recent years, he added, is that lawmakers have scoured the budget looking for extra dollars, trust funds and loan programs for revenue, therefore borrowing against the future.
“I’m not getting the feeling as I have in the past of the urgency of all four caucuses scrambling to get the budget done by the deadline. This is year in negotiations they’re making sure they’re getting it right,” Barrar said.
For constituents a delayed budget isn’t a sign of patience, but rather a yearly occurrence in which the longer the talks stall, the more students suffer, the more state employees are furloughed and the more cuts are seen in statefunded programs.
“We have 5,000 intellectually disabled individuals waiting to get their approval of services — these are high school graduates who after receiving services from their public school education are now left with no services,” said Jeff Garis, the Outreach and Engagement Director of the Pennsylvania Budget and Policy Center.
His organization, which is a “non-partisan research organization that offers credible individual analysis of state budget and policy issues,” was joined by about a dozen other teachers, activists and support staff outside the Delaware County Courthouse in Media Wednesday night for a “vigil for a fair PA budget.”
Denise Kennedy, a secretary at Garrettford Elementary School, as well as the president of the Southeastern Region of the Pennsylvania State Education Association, who has been a vocal proponent of the Chester Upland School District teacher’s contracts, expressed the importance of extracurricular programming in public schools.
Herself a mother of three children born with disabilities, said thanks to the public school system at Upper Darby, her grown children are now “successful adults who contribute to society.” And further, she said just this year three students at her school, all younger than the 5th grade, have lost fathers to opioid overdoses.
“If you follow the Pennsylvania budget history, it has become generally accepted as a very complicated process. It’s rarely finalized on time, and what has become commonplace is that education advocates have to work very hard to get proper funding,” Kennedy said. “Every year it’s the same story. Will we get enough? Will we have to cut programs? Will we have to layoff teachers and support staff?
“The process is maddening and defies economic sense.”
Allison Kruk, a candidate for the Marple Newtown School Board and activist for Delco PA Indivisible, said the disparity between education funding in Pennsylvania and the amount that is contributed from the state budget.
“States with no statewide income tax and no statewide sales tax do a better job of covering education than Pennsylvania state government does,” Kruk said.
She called the Pennsylvania Public School Employees’ Retirement System (PSERS) “infuriatingly mismanaged” which has limited the pension fund to only paying 57 percent of its liabilities and creating a $43 billion shortfall.
Garis said his analysis of the budget has resulted in proposed solutions in taxing natural gas drilling, closing corporate tax loopholes and a fair share plan that would require an amendment to Pennsylvania’s uniformity clause.
More hopeful about sending a bill back to the House by the end of the week was Sen. Tom Killion, R-9 of Middletown, who said in a statement that priorities of his constituents remain chiefly among his concerns.
“I am encouraged about reported progress on budget negotiations and remain hopeful that we will get a budget done soon,” Killion said.