Wolf, GOP ramp up budget rhetoric

HARRISBURG - Within hours of returning to the Capitol after a two-week break, the Republican-controlled legislature and Gov. Wolf found themselves Monday in a near-showdown over his proposed $30 billion budget.

By day's end, Wolf was standing before reporters to call on the House of Representatives to get serious about negotiating a spending plan for the fiscal year that begins July 1.

"Let me just be clear: What the Republicans did was a stunt," Wolf said in an unscheduled late-afternoon news conference. "This is the kind of gamesmanship we were not sent here to play."

Republicans countered that Wolf was the one attempting to toy with the legislative process - and that they are committed to passing an on-time budget.

The rhetoric set the tone for a difficult month ahead, as Wolf, a Democrat in his first year in office, attempts to persuade legislators to adopt his budget blueprint, which calls for a fundamental shift in how and how much residents pay in taxes.

Signs of trouble emerged early Monday, when House Republicans introduced a spending measure that would merely mirror this year's spending plan and did not include any of Wolf's proposals. They said they wanted to have a placeholder on the legislative books as budget talks continued.

Democrats in the chamber said the blueprint the GOP leaders had put in the system failed to address even the rising costs of current programs - and that if it somehow took hold, it would result in draconian cuts to services statewide.

"For the last four years, when we've done the budget in Pennsylvania, basically what we've ended up with is phony budgets," said Rep. Joe Markosek of Allegheny County, the ranking Democrat on the Appropriations Committee. "Here we are today doing the same thing."

They moved to amend the bill to include Wolf's proposed spending increases for public schools and other programs and departments.

Seeing an opening, the Republicans seized the moment.

They countered by amending the bill to include all of Wolf's proposed tax increases, including the crux of the administration's budget plan: raising the income and sales tax to fund a massive property tax-relief plan. It was a procedural move designed to send a message.

As they determine each year how much the state will spend, on what and how it will pay for it, both sides typically negotiate the details before putting them into print. By putting both the governor's spending plan and his funding proposal on the table at the same time long before a budget deal is struck, the Republicans were setting Wolf's plan up for a vote - one that at this stage he likely lacks the support to win.

The GOP's point: You can't talk about Wolf's budget without discussing how he wants to raise the money to support it.

"We will not turn Harrisburg into Washington, D.C.," said House Majority Leader Dave Reed (R., Indiana). "We will not spend money that does not exist."

In the end, the amendment was rejected, and Republicans were quick to call it proof that Wolf's plan doesn't have support, even in his own party.

Wolf had a different take. Republicans, he said, were trying to show muscle and attempting to embarrass his administration.

"What we saw was just one more bit of evidence that the Republicans want to just perpetuate the status quo," he said. "We all know the status quo simply does not work."

Wolf's proposal calls for raising existing taxes and imposing new ones at levels that have not been seen in years.

The new revenue would land at a critical time. The state is staring at a more than $2 billion deficit and increasing costs for public employee pensions and health care for the poor.

Wolf's plan would use sizable chunks of that new revenue for a nearly $1 billion bump in education funding.

Wolf's budget would also increase the state's personal income tax from 3.07 percent to 3.7 percent, and the sales tax from 6 percent to 6.6 percent. Much of the money raised from those tax hikes would go toward funding the governor's proposed property tax relief plan, worth $3.8 billion.

"We need a real conversation on that," the governor said Monday, "not stunts."

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