A prominent state union praised Pennsylvania Democratic Gov. Tom Wolf for vetoing a Republican budget proposal which provided short-term spending.
“The House GOP budget was incomplete, unbalanced, and severely short-changed our public schools, while adding to a ballooning structural deficit,” the state’s AFL-CIO President Rick Bloomingdale said Tuesday. “It is unacceptable that the State House dismissed their members to return home rather than finishing their work on behalf of Pennsylvania’s 12.8 million residents.”
State lawmakers have been in a bitter stalemate over the budget for the past six months. The Republican majority has been able to advance a short-term stopgap budget proposal but it was shifty vetoed by Gov. Wolf. The Pennsylvania AFL-CIO is praising the veto arguing the proposal was unacceptable.
Wolf has already promised to veto any stopgap proposal while also encouraging the $30.8 billion Democrat long-term framework budget. He noted the proposal cut education funds as a primary reason. Wolf claimed that it would have cut $95 million from state public education.
“In doing this, I’m expressing the outrage that all of us should feel about the garbage the Republican legislative leaders have tried to dump on us,” Wolf said in a statement. “This budget is wrong for Pennsylvania.”
Critics of the Republican stopgap budget note the biggest concern is that it provides only short term funding. It designed to provide relief for the state which has gone without a budget because of the legislative dispute. Republicans have been trying to rein in state spending but have touched on areas Democrats support.
The SEIU Pennsylvania State Council, though, argued Dec. 22 that the stopgap budget was actually in retaliation over a failed pension reform. Pennsylvania is among the many states currently in a pension crisis. A proposal to reform the pension system proposed Dec. 7 failed to pass the state House. State union leaders led much of the push to oppose the reform.
The SEIU claims the failed reforms would not actually address pension debt in the state but rather make it worse. The Pennsylvania AFL-CIO has also rejected the proposal as dangerous. The Commonwealth Foundation found the state has $50 billion in unfunded pension liabilities.
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