Rendell wants to sign state budget by Sunday
Share with others:
HARRISBURG -- Gov. Ed Rendell wants the Legislature to end what he called "an embarrassment" by sending him a 2009-10 budget by Sunday.
At a news conference yesterday, Mr. Rendell called on the House and Senate to meet every day beginning tomorrow to settle differences of the $27.9 billion spending plan.
"My goal is to sign a budget by Sunday," he told reporters yesterday, while admitting there is still opposition from some legislators on major revenue-raisers in the budget proposal. Those include opening up 80,000 more acres in state forests for natural gas drilling; extending the state sales tax to arts and cultural event tickets; setting a tax rate and upfront license fee for table games at casinos; and imposing a new 20 percent tax on "small games of chance" prizes awarded by veterans and fraternal clubs.
"It's time we had a budget," Mr. Rendell said.
He called Pennsylvania's status as the only state in the nation without a 2009-10 budget "an embarrassment. Many groups and agencies are suffering by not getting their allocations of state funds."
Mr. Rendell met with legislative leaders yesterday and said they generally expressed confidence they can get the proposed budget, whose framework was agreed to 10 days ago, approved by Sunday.
However, Senate Majority Leader Dominic Pileggi, R-Delaware, didn't promise that action will be final by then.
Completing budget work by Sunday "is probably a best-case scenario," he said.
Mr. Rendell admitted there could be "a hiccup" that would delay final action on all eight budget-related bills by a day or two. Besides the spending bill, there is a tax code bill; a table games at casinos bill; a small games of chance bill; and several others.
Senate and House members will be at the Capitol today but there won't be any voting sessions. Those will start tomorrow and go as many days as needed. House Democrats will meet in closed caucus today to discuss the budget.
Mr. Rendell said he is unhappy about legislative leaders' decision to extend the sales tax to tickets of arts and cultural groups, as well as museums and zoos. But that option was on a list of 20 sales-tax exemptions that the governor had agreed to remove, so he said he'll go along with it.
"No one is happy about all aspects of the budget proposal," he said.
Legislators have said that some of the revenue raised by that ticket tax will go into a special budget account, separate from the general fund, to help arts groups in the state.
Mr. Rendell was asked why the Steelers, Pirates, Eagles and Phillies aren't getting the sales tax extended to their tickets. He said that under the four current stadium leases, any such taxes would have to be paid by their host cities, and he said Pittsburgh and Philadelphia already have serious budget problems of their own and couldn't afford to pay the additional sales tax.
Mr. Pileggi said that besides resolving a tax rate and license fee for table games, another issue is whether the two Category 3 casinos -- the smaller, "resort hotel" casinos -- would be allowed to have table games. There is also an issue about whether to increase their limit on slots machines, now set at 500.
Rep. David Levdansky, D-Forward, and about 20 other House Democrats have sharply criticized the idea of opening up 80,000 more acres of state forest for natural gas drilling. That's less than the original idea of opening up 225,000 more state-owned acres, in addition to the 600,000 acres already open for drilling. This land has valuable Marcellus shale underground, where the gas is released by sending water at high pressure into the rock, fracturing it.
If opponents are able to block the leasing of the additional forest land for drilling, some other source of revenue would have to be found as a substitute.
Mr. Rendell said he still has two non-negotiable goals for the 2009-10 budget: that it provide adequate money for education, health care and economic development, and that it provide adequate "recurring tax revenue" so the state doesn't find itself in a financial hole next summer, as it's been this summer by ending fiscal 2008-09 with a $3.2 billion deficit.
First Published September 29, 2009 12:00 am
