(The Center Square) \u2013 There\u2019s an old saying that only two things in life are certain: death and taxes.<\/p>\n
Perhaps Pennsylvania\u2019s hopelessly gridlocked Legislature may add one more: division. It\u2019s a chasm that, for now, is too broad for even the most engineering of cartoon characters to pole vault across.<\/p>\n
Instead, Democrats and Republicans watch as cash from taxpayers\u2019 wallets floats down into the darkness of the canyon between them, with no apparent urgency to stop it, not even as Democratic Gov. Josh Shapiro cuts an authoritative figure on the horizon.<\/p>\n
That\u2019s where figurative negotiation of the state budget stands, now 109 days overdue. It\u2019s the kind of lapse that could shut off the lights or send taxpayers to collections.<\/p>\n
It will soon close the doors to county welfare offices, domestic violence shelters, and rape crisis centers.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, some schools lean deep into reserves, teetering just over the minimum balance legally required, even as a court ruling demands more funding not less.<\/p>\n
But who should extend the proverbial olive branch? Democrats argue that they\u2019ve done so a handful of times, only to be met with silence. Their latest attempt, a $50 billion spending plan that shaved roughly $1 billion off Shapiro\u2019s opening bid in February, was meant to illustrate their willingness to compromise.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s still close to $3 billion more than what the state has available to spend, according to Senate Republicans. For now, they argue, a stopgap measure that funds government at last year\u2019s levels would ease the pain inflicted on schools, counties, and taxpayers.<\/p>\n
In a statement from the chamber\u2019s top GOP leaders, Sens. Joe Pittman and Kim Ward pointed out that the state\u2019s budget has ballooned 67% over the last decade, which \u201cmakes it clear that we must control the growth of our expenditures to prevent a fiscal calamity in the coming years.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat Democrats continuously fail to realize is that divided government requires true compromise,\u201d Pittman and Ward said. \u201cThis means a final budget agreement cannot simply be a checkbook for their reckless spending but must be a reasonable plan, which also includes Republican policies to support families and foster greater economic growth for Pennsylvania.\u201d<\/p>\n
Democrats say the \u201ccopy and paste\u201d budget amounts to less than nothing.<\/p>\n
\u201cLet me tell you what that actually means,\u201d said Rep. Jordan Harris, the Philadelphia Democrat who leads the House Appropriations Committee in what has been long considered one of the most influential chairmanships in the chamber. \u201cThat means they were willing to defund our police. That means they were willing to defund our schools. That means they were willing to defund our health care system in Pennsylvania.<\/p>\n
\u201cBecause here\u2019s the thing. Just like you all sitting at home, you have an increase in your gas, your electric, you have an increase in your bills at home. The same way you have an increase, so does the state.\u201d<\/p>\n
Shapiro, an ally to House Democrats, said divulging his own conversations with leadership doesn\u2019t help a deal get signed.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat is helpful is for the Senate to get its act together, get back to work and pass a budget,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Voters don\u2019t see it that way, according to analysis from The Commonwealth Foundation, a nonprofit based in Harrisburg that supports fiscal conservancy. Rather, it\u2019s 72% who think Shapiro should be leading the way. Roughly two-thirds reject the four-figure tax hike that would land on families to support the $50 billion spending plan.<\/p>\n
\u201cGovernor Shapiro and House Democrats remain entrenched in partisanship around their insistence on runaway spending,\u201d Erik Telford, a foundation spokesman, told The Center Square in an email. \u201cTheir plan calls for billions in deficit spending and would saddle working families with a nearly $2,000 tax hike.\u201d<\/p>\n
Telford\u2019s comments echo their statewide call for the governor to \u201cdo your job\u201d and \u201cstop hurting Pennsylvanians,\u201d which will air on major networks across the state this weekend.<\/p>\n
\u201cPennsylvanians reject this reckless approach and expect Shapiro to do his job \u2013\u00a0show leadership, work with the Senate, and deliver a responsible, bipartisan budget,\u201d he said. \u201cSo far, he\u2019s been either unwilling or unable to do that, and Pennsylvanians are paying the price.\u201d<\/p>\n
The House doesn\u2019t return to session until Oct. 27, while the Senate remains on a 24-hour call.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"(The Center Square) \u2013 There\u2019s an old saying that only two things in life are certain: death and…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":7020,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[1930,28,30,29],"class_list":["post-7019","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-pennsylvania","tag-accountability","tag-pennsylvania","tag-pennsylvania-headlines","tag-pennsylvania-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7019","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7019"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7019\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7020"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7019"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7019"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7019"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}