Rally at City Hall protests new Pa. budget

Chanting "Stop the Cuts," hundreds of people representing nonprofits that aid libraries, schools, disabled people and others rallied against Harrisburg's budget today at noon at City Hall.

"This is getting to be an old story. They're going to balance the budget on the backs of working people," Patrick Eiding, president of the Philadelphia Council of the AFL-CIO told the crowd.

The Southeastern Pennsylvania Budget Coalition, a group that includes about 100 nonprofit organizations, organized the rally. The coalition is urging legislators to prevent cuts that its members fear will force them to reduce services. To pay for continued services, the coalition wants Harrisburg to raise revenues in several ways, including taxing smokeless tobacco products and cigars and changing proposed taxes on natural gas production so that revenues would arrive more quickly.

Some signs read "Support our Libraries, not Big Tobacco."

Nofre Vaquer, associate director of ARC of Philadelphia, an organization that serves people with intellectual disabilities, came to the rally with several clients of the Philadelphia Developmental Disabilities Corp. of North Philadelphia. It provides job counseling and other services to about 400 disabled adults.

"We want to make sure everybody knows that we don't need any cuts in the budget," Vaquer said.