Now 100 days late, the Pa. House OK’d a $50.3 billion budget but still no agreement with Senate as tempers flare

HARRISBURG — Now 100 days late on a state budget, the Democratic-led Pennsylvania House and the Republican-controlled Senate moved forward Wednesday with a flurry of activity that still resulted in partisan finger-pointing and no funding plan.

The activity was a significant change for both chambers, which have done little work publicly on the state budget, as the closed-door talks among top leaders have slowed in recent weeks since a new revenue stream for mass transit was removed from the negotiation table. But neither chamber took action in agreement with the other, showing that Pennsylvania’s divided government remains at odds — leaving the state’s most critical services at risk.

The budget impasse, now in its fourth month, has become more dire for schools, counties, and social service providers as time has gone on. Philadelphia’s only rape-crisis center laid off its staff earlier this week and will not be able to provide vital services like its 24-7 crisis hotline, court advocacy services, and more. Schools have had to take out loans to continue operating, and some counties around the state have frozen spending or laid off employees.

Democrats appeared to reach their breaking point Wednesday.

In a fiery news conference, top House and Senate Democrats said the budget impasse falls squarely on Senate Republicans, whom they accused of trying to politically damage Democratic Gov. Josh Shapiro ahead of next year’s election through the budget standoff.

“Every week we’ve been close to a deal. Every week we’re at the one-yard line,” said House Speaker Joanna McClinton (D., Philadelphia). “One hundred days is absolutely unacceptable.”

Democrats also said that Republican leaders are unable to get the most conservative members of their caucus to pass a budget. House Majority Leader Matt Bradford (D., Montgomery) said Democrats, who hold a one-seat majority in the state House, have been patient with Senate Republicans’ “internal dysfunctions.”

But that patience has worn out.

“There’s an agreement to be done. There’s been an agreement to be done for months,” Bradford said. “We are willing to compromise on every single issue. And there are 102 Democrats that would be heartbroken by almost every one of those compromises, but we will do them because government must be open and it must work.”

Senate Republicans rejected the Democrats’ claims, and characterized them as trying to run up the bill on the taxpayers’ dime.

They said that the Senate GOP’s conservative approach is necessary to keep the state from enacting a tax increase in future years and that it is House Democratic leaders and Shapiro who are not on the same page.

On Wednesday, the House amended the budget bill the Senate passed in August, which would have maintained the previous fiscal year’s spending level of $47.6 billion.

House Democrats’ amended version of the bill set spending at nearly $50.3 billion and includes major funding increases for public education and the state’s Medicaid programs. It passed the House with a 105-98 vote, with three Republicans joining Democrats to approve its passage.

House Republicans unsuccessfully tried to revert the spending bill back to the Senate’s numbers from the last fiscal year, in an effort to get the money flowing to schools, counties, and social services around the state.

Bradford said the House would amend the Senate bill in response to requests from President Pro Tempore Kim Ward (R., Westmoreland) in The Inquirer last week to “bring it out in the public” and send the Senate back a budget proposal.

On the Senate side, Senate Republicans advanced a bill to forgive any interest accrued by certain programs that access a new $500 million loan program offered by Treasurer Stacy Garrity, a Republican who is running for governor and has been endorsed by the state party.

That program is available to county social service departments, early education programs, and rape crisis centers.

“We’re prepared to figure out a path forward in this, but the rhetoric of today is not how you achieve a path forward,” said Senate Majority Leader Joe Pittman (R., Indiana). “The rhetoric of today has taken this budgetary process, as cumbersome and as difficult as it’s been, steps backward, and it has proven even more critically important that Treasurer Garrity step forward in the manner that she did to address some of the most critical needs out there in the commonwealth.”

Shapiro, in a brief news conference Wednesday evening, said the Senate needs to approve the House budget proposal, and he referenced his own high approval numbers as proof that their attempts to hurt him politically have been unsuccessful.

“What the House did today represents real compromise,” Shapiro said. “It is ridiculous that the Senate can’t get its act together and pass a budget.”

“If they were motivated in the beginning to play political games, we all know that’s failed, right? I’m in good shape,” Shapiro added.

How Senate Republicans will handle the House Democrats’ budget proposal is still to be seen. But it will be done more quickly than it took House Democrats to send them back a proposal, Ward said.

“It’ll be less than two months,” Ward joked.

Pennsylvania is the only state without any form of state budget approved. Michigan finalized its state budget earlier this week, and North Carolina lawmakers will return to session in the coming months to finalize their budget after passing a six-month budget earlier this year.