Gov. Tom Wolf and the Pennsylvania legislature remain stalemated over a $30 billion, nine-months-late fiscal 2016 budget, even after lawmakers sent the governor another version.
The House of Representatives Wednesday night approved a spending plan by a 128-63 vote after the Senate approved it earlier in the day, 31-18. Republicans who dominate both chambers say the latest budget has no tax increases.
Wolf, a first-term Democrat at odds with the Republican-controlled legislature, said he would veto the budget "in its current form." He said the plan still leaves the commonwealth with a $1.6 billion deficit that would trigger "massive cuts to education, teacher layoffs, higher property taxes and cuts to vital programs for seniors."
Pennsylvania has received five credit downgrades in the last three years, with bond rating agencies citing budget imbalance and an unfunded pension liability estimated at around $60 billion.
Standard & Poor's placed its AA-minus general obligation rating on credit watch with negative implications March 3. Fitch Ratings also assigns Pennsylvania GOs its AA-minus rating while Moody's Investors Service rates them Aa3.
The latest plan would raise spending 3%, or about $875 million, from the approved fiscal 2015 budget, but $238 million less than what lawmakers passed in December. Wolf approved about 80% of the plan but vetoed other items in an attempt to hold out for increases in basic education.
“This is the third time they have attempted to pass an unbalanced budget with no consultation with the administration," said Wolf, who also exercised his veto in June 2015. “The math in the latest version still does not work."
