Harrisburg – June 29, 2012 – The state Senate passed a revised $27.65 billion state budget today that includes a number of initiatives authored by Senate Democrats and $775 million more for key line items above Gov. Tom Corbett’s proposed budget, state Sen. Jay Costa (D-Allegheny) said today.
Costa voted in favor of the budget bill. The measure cleared the Senate on 32-17 vote.
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“The revised state budget includes funding that Senate Democrats sought for Accountability Block Grants, higher education and mortgage protection,” Costa said. “Significantly, the plan is a stark departure from the harsh budget proposed by Gov. Corbett in February.
“The plan does not increase taxes and resources are stretched to try and cover some critical needs.”
Costa said that the governor’s plan called for a $267 million cut for higher education, the stripping of funds for specialized hospital services, human service programs and no new real dollars for education.
“The final budget includes more dollars for Accountability Block Grants and a rollback of severe budget cuts that were part of the governor’s budget outline,” Costa said.
“If the governor’s plan were rubber-stamped, school districts, hospitals, social services and many other vulnerable programs would be in jeopardy.”
The final budget nearly flat funds basic education but adds $100 million for Accountability Block Grants, $50 million for distressed schools and funding for hospital services such as obstetric and neonatal care, trauma, burn centers and critical-care access. It also adds another $25 million for education tax credits already created in law and provides another $50 million for a new tax credit program to help students in underperforming schools.
Despite voting in favor of the plan, Costa said that the budget has major problems.
“Unfortunately, key county human service funds, welfare department programs that touch individuals directly and General Assistance grants aimed at helping those in dire need were eliminated or severely reduced,” Costa said. “This will hurt 70,000 Pennsylvanians who rely on the program.”
Costa noted that child care monies and county human service program funds were partially restored.
He said that the framework for the budget came from a spending plan worked on and passed in the Senate in early June. Senate Democrats were able to take part in those discussions then work through the process to defend the restorations as the bill wound its way through the legislative process.
“The state budget that we considered today is not the one that I would have crafted were Senate Democrats in charge of the process – these are not our priorities,” Costa said. “However, given the constraints set by the governor and the resources that were available, it is a tight budget.”
The state’s fiscal year ends June 30.
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HARRISBURG, June 28, 2012 — Senate Democratic Leader Jay Costa issued the following statement on the U.S. Supreme Court’s landmark ruling to uphold the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act:
“The Supreme Court made the correct decision. The reform provides access to health care for millions of Pennsylvanians, from college students, to those with pre-existing conditions, seniors who have high prescription costs and others. The reforms provide life-saving access to health care for all Americans.”
Millions of Pennsylvanians benefit under the law, including 1.4 million uninsured Pennsylvanians; 2.1 million Pennsylvanians who have pre-existing medical conditions; and 4.5 million Pennsylvanians who have had lifetime limits on benefits removed.
Nationally, more than 54 million individuals with private health insurance, including more than 20 million women, have received preventative health care at no cost, and 5 million seniors on Medicare have saved an average of $635 each on prescription drugs.
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Monroeville, June 14, 2012 — Education experts, labor leaders, area school administrators and school board members today laid out disastrous financial problems at a state Senate hearing on the impact of state public school funding cuts.
Held at Sen. Jim Brewster’s (D-Allegheny/Westmoreland) request, the hearing was aimed at gaining a better understanding of how state funding cuts are impacting schools and taxpayers. Testimony was also offered on ways to raise additional revenues or establish greater school efficiencies.
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“Despite the proposed state subsidy restorations, area school boards continue to struggle with dire financial challenges that have resulted in curriculum cutbacks, teacher lay-offs and steep local property tax hikes,” Brewster said. “This discussion enabled local school officials and educational experts to weigh in on their funding challenges, and ways we can adequately and reliably fund our public schools.”
Sen. Lisa Boscola (D-Northampton/Lehigh/Monroe), who chairs the committee, added, “As we finalize the state’s budget in the days ahead, school funding will be one of more crucial and controversial issues. Gaining input from school board members and administrators across the state who are actually in the trenches struggling with funding shortfalls will be invaluable to us.”
In his testimony, Sen. Andrew Dinniman (D-Chester/Montgomery), who serves as Democratic chair of the Senate Education Committee, said the state now provides $352 million less for public schools than it did in fiscal 2008-09. He said less state support has translated into higher property taxes, an “onerous tax that takes no measure of true wealth or income.”
He added that the Corbett Administration’s school funding shortfalls are leading children from “the school door to the prison gate,” will fail to prepare our children for the new world economy and threaten to “destroy Pennsylvania’s ability to compete economically for decades into the future.”
All of the area superintendents and school board members who testified sharply criticized the Corbett Administration’s education policies. Many predicted that a growing number of schools would soon be facing deficits and on the brink of financial collapse. Many pointed to dwindling state subsidies, unfunded mandates and being cornered into annually hiking property taxes, furloughing teachers and cutting educational programs.
Michael Crossey, president of the Pennsylvania State Education Association, told the senators there are very few incentives for young people to go into the teaching profession these days because of the widespread funding uncertainty and lack of respect for teachers.
Boscola commended Brewster for his “unrelenting efforts to find additional revenue sources to supplement stagnant school subsidies.
Last year Brewster introduced legislation that would dedicate half of a 7 percent natural gas drilling fee for public school funding. The bill would generate $280 million annually, but majority Republicans have buried the proposal in a senate committee.
In both of his first two years in office, Gov. Corbett proposed steep educational funding cuts in his budget proposals. Last year, the governor proposed cutting $1.1 billion before the legislature restored $200 million. This year, the senate version of the budget bill would level fund public school funding by restoring an additional $100 million. Boscola predicted that this year’s budget will be finalized in the next week or two.
Brewster said many school districts cannot absorb huge state funding cuts with growing personnel costs, rising energy and physical plant costs and skyrocketing employee pension costs.
“While the Corbett Administration boasts about holding the line on state taxes, they have fostered a tax shifting shell game that leaves our schools, students and taxpayers out on a limb,” Brewster said. “Our kids deserve an opportunity for a good education, not some cut-rate abbreviated mishmash that does little more than sound good in right wing stump speeches.”
Joining Boscola, Brewster and Dinniman at the hearing were Democratic Leader Jay Costa (D-Allegheny), and Senators Wayne Fontana (D-Allegheny), Vincent Hughes (D-Phila.), Rich Kasunic (D-Fayette/Somerset), and Tim Solobay (D-Washington).
Those who testified included: Senator Andrew Dinniman, Democratic Chairman of the Senate Education Committee;Michael J. Crossey, president of the Pennsylvania State Education Association (PSEA); Robert Pallone, president of the New Kensington-Arnold School District School Board; Richard P. Livingston, president of the Clairton City School District Board of Directors; Marilyn Messina, president of the Woodland Hills School District Board of Education; Dr. George Batterson, superintendent of the New Kensington-Arnold School District; Dr. Bart Rocco, superintendent of the Elizabeth-Forward School District; and Dr. Michael Panza, superintendent of the Sto-Rox School District
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HARRISBURG, June 8, 2012 — Democratic Leader Jay Costa offered the following statement on the Legislative Reapportionment Commission’s adoption of a final legislative reapportionment plan:
“The reapportionment process has been long and taken many twists and turns. Unfortunately, we are right back to where we started when the Supreme Court rejected the previous gerrymandered map. Incredibly, in the face of clear guidance from the court and provisions of the state constitution, the commission adopted another gerrymandered map.
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“The map contains way too many inexplicable and unnecessary partisan county splits that run afoul of the court and the constitution. Plus, Republicans applied different data when they drew eastern and western Pennsylvania districts. Their arbitrary and inconsistent use of performance data in the east and registration numbers in the west conveniently benefits their party.
“The final map is the product of a broken and bewildering process in which the public was ignored and negotiation was illusory. The map is a total disappointment.”
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HARRISBURG – June 4, 2012 – State Sen. Jay Costa, the Senate’s Democratic Leader, unveiled legislation that would institute protections for programs serving seniors if Gov. Tom Corbett decides to proceed with privatizing the management of the state lottery.
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“If the governor seeks to privatize the management of the state lottery, there must be parameters and safeguards in place to protect the Lottery Fund,” Costa said. “Programs for seniors are way too important to be put in jeopardy and should not be subjected to the profit imperative.”
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[/frame]Earlier this year, Corbett announced that he was exploring a private management agreement for the lottery, arguing that it is necessary to generate sufficient revenue to fund future costs. The governor’s office released their assessment that a private management team could have generated an extra $275 million in revenue had it been in place from 2008 through 2011.
“The legislation that I am offering does not interfere with the governor’s planned examination of privatization,” Costa said. “My bill puts teeth into the process and ensures that programs helping seniors are not jeopardized, workers are not threatened and that there is proper oversight.”
Costa said his plan relies heavily on openness, public accountability and scrutiny. The lawmaker said his legislation would require the following as a part of the management contract:
- Contracts cannot be longer than five years;
- Control is retained over significant business decisions – the lottery cannot be sold;
- Information may be demanded for any aspect of lottery operations;
- Advance notice must be given about operating decisions that impact public interests;
- Principal offices must be located in Pennsylvania;
- A percentage of the business must be reserved for minority-owned enterprises.
Costa said that an important aspect of his legislation is the public review of the proposed plan. The contact should be open and done through public bidding and the selection based on stringent bidding protection.
“My plan requires that prior to the selection of a vendor, a public hearing is held and the two finalists unveiled,” Costa said. “I also believe it important for the governor to make the final decision and that the reason he choose one or the other bidder be disclosed.”
The Department of Revenue would be required to report back to the General Assembly on a quarterly basis and the entire operation can be completely investigated in the third and fifth year of the contact.
Costa said the language in the bill is patterned after a similar proposal in Illinois which recently privatized its lottery management.
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