Pennsylvania‘s over 100-day budget impasse is nearing an end after the General Assembly passed a state budget exceeding $50 billion and sent the deal to Gov. Josh Shapiro’s (D-PA) desk on Wednesday afternoon.
The impasse hit Pennsylvania school budgets hard as public school administrators began to warn of the long-term impacts on district operations. The over four-month stalemate between the state’s two parties showed tangible signs of ending this week when lawmakers agreed to a funding deal, in which Democrats agreed to withdraw from the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative as part of the negotiations.
Republicans have opposed the initiative as a hindrance to Pennsylvania’s natural gas programs since former Democratic Gov. Tom Wolf joined the group in 2022, according to The Philadelphia Inquirer. Democrats conceded the state’s membership to the initiative in order to secure more funding for public schools and an earned income tax credit for lower-income families, according to the Associated Press.
The state House first passed the budget by a vote of 156-47, and the Senate then also confirmed it by a vote of 40-9. Most of the no votes came from the Republican caucus, except for two Democratic senators and one Democratic House member who also voted no.
Republican state Rep. Kristin Marcell of Bucks County voted in favor of the bill and touted its ability to fund the state “without raising taxes or tapping into the Rainy Day Fund.” She also praised the deal for pulling Pennsylvania out of the RGGI.
“This will give our energy industry the jumpstart it needs to grow to meet the increasing energy demands of Pennsylvanians and our country as a whole,” Marcell said.
Marcell and Democratic State Rep. Mike Schlossberg of Lehigh County, who also voted for the bill, each touted the budget’s investments in education. Marcell highlighted the budget’s investment in Career and Technical Education, which amounted to a state appropriation of over $144 million.
“This budget represents our continued efforts to ensure fair funding for Parkland and Allentown schools, invests in critically needed mental healthcare, reduces costs for Pennsylvanians, and gets stuff done in Pennsylvania,” Schlossberg said.
However, the bipartisan-passed budget also led to some bipartisan pushback, with Republican no-votes arguing that the spending still went too far and Democratic no-votes contending that their caucus had conceded too much.
“I voted NO on the main budget bill because it spends too much. The governor’s budget proposal would have resulted in a tax increase in 2027. The lower spending level in the bill passed today will still cause a tax increase, but not until 2028. Pennsylvania is overspending, not undertaxing,” GOP state Rep. Brad Roae said.
Democratic state Rep. Greg Vitali, a staunch environmentalist, criticized the legislation for conceding the RGGI. He told Spotlight PA that the Democrats are “caving in” to Republicans and sacrificing the “only serious thing,” the RGGI, that would help address climate change in Pennsylvania.
“Democrats and the governor have ceded to this, along with other environmental asks, as a way of coming to a budget agreement and getting other things they deem important,” Vitali said.
PENNSYLVANIA FUNDING HAS SPIKED 64% UNDER LAST TWO GOVERNORS
The free-market-based public policy think tank, the Commonwealth Foundation, praised the move, with the group’s COO and general counsel stating that lawmakers “finally freed our commonwealth from the threat of crippling energy taxes under RGGI.”
Shapiro, who has been acutely involved in the budget deal, is expected to sign the budget on Wednesday afternoon.
