All told, Shapiro’s spending request would increase total authorized spending by 9% through the state’s main bank account, or about .8 billion, including a 0 million supplemental request for the current year’s spending.Still, lawyers for the schools that sued the state were asking for much more than Shapiro is proposing, while nursing home operators, home-care […]
All told, Shapiro’s spending request would increase total authorized spending by 9% through the state’s main bank account, or about .8 billion, including a 0 million supplemental request for the current year’s spending.Still, lawyers for the schools that sued the state were asking for much more than Shapiro is proposing, while nursing home operators, home-care providers and counties that maintain mental health networks were also hoping for substantial increases in aid.To help unveil it, Shapiro delivered a budget speech to a joint session of the General Assembly in the state House of Representatives’ chamber in which he touted his efforts to help Pennsylvania’s economy compete with other states. He urged lawmakers to be willing to invest the state’s surplus cash.
Tax collections are projected to increase by .3 billion to .3 billion, or 5%, but a large portion of that rests on whether lawmakers will go along with several proposals by Shapiro.This year’s .6 billion spending plan required about billion of surplus cash to balance, eliciting warnings from Republicans that the state must slow the pace of spending or risk depleting its surplus within several years.
Shapiro’s spending plan breaks $50 billion for the first time
Anything that passes will have to get through a divided Legislature, with the House controlled by Democrats and the Senate by Republicans.Follow Marc Levy on X at: https://x.com/timelywriterThe plan also seeks to shave reimbursements to cyber charter schools, saving nearly 0 million in payments by public schools, and close two state prisons, with the state’s 24 prisons at about 82% capacity.
Most of the new education money — 6 million — is viewed as part of a multiyear, multibillion-dollar response to a court decision that found that Pennsylvania’s system of public school funding violates the constitutional rights of students in the poorest districts.Shapiro’s proposal tops billion for a state budget in Pennsylvania for the first time, requesting .5 billion for the 2025-2026 fiscal year beginning July 1 as Shapiro gears up for his re-election campaign.
The plan needs surplus cash and new sources of money to balance
The budget proposal holds the line on personal income and sales tax rates, the state’s two largest sources of income. But it instead uses about .5 billion in reserve cash to balance — the second straight year of multibillion-dollar deficits.Shapiro does have a cushion of about .5 billion in reserve, thanks to federal COVID-19 relief and inflation-juiced tax collections over the past few years. Shapiro’s proposal would leave about .4 billion of that unspent.HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) — Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro will seek more money for underfunded public schools and public transit in his budget proposal unveiled Tuesday, while he is also hoping to win support for legalizing marijuana and introducing taxes on skill games viewed as competitors to casinos and lottery contests.
“Pennsylvania is on the rise and we’re not going to stop,” Shapiro said in a prepared copy of his remarks. “We have the resources we need to make smart investments now and maintain a responsible balance in reserve.”That includes raising almost .2 billion from legalizing adult-use marijuana, expanding how the corporate net income tax is applied and introducing taxes on the skill games that are increasingly cropping up in bars, pizzerias, convenience stores and standalone parlors.The budget would spend 5 million more, or another 7%, to take another step toward Shapiro’s goal of ending a waiting list of thousands of families who are considered to be in dire need of help for an intellectually disabled adult relative.Of that, more than billion would go to toward human services, including medical care for the poor, and another 0 million would go toward K-12 schools and higher education institutions, including Penn State, Temple, Pitt and state-owned system schools.
The union that represents prison staff, the Pennsylvania State Corrections Officers Association, swiftly said that it will fight the closures, saying closing two prisons will endanger officers and inmates. The Democrat — a rising star in the party who is seen as a potential 2028 White House contender — is also seeking more money for universities, offering hundreds of millions of dollars in tax breaks to encourage new power plant construction and relying on billions in surplus cash to balance spending.Shapiro’s hands are tied to a great extent, bound by a huge increase in costs for the medical care for the poor, as well as a slow-growing economy and a shrinking workforce that is delivering relatively meager gains in tax collections.
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Elsewhere in the plan, Shapiro is proposing to send nearly 0 million more, or about 20% more, to public transit agencies as he works to stave off cutbacks by the Southeastern Pennsylvania Transportation Authority, the Philadelphia region’s public transit agency struggling to regain ridership lost during the pandemic.
