Committee meets to discuss budget, but takes no action

By Mario F. Cattabiani and Amy Worden

Inquirer Harrisburg Bureau

HARRISBURG - After months of rancorous debate, state lawmakers finally agreed on a spending plan and sent it to the governor's desk yesterday. Unfortunately, it happened in Hartford, not Harrisburg, in a move that will soon make Pennsylvania the only state in the nation doing business without a budget.

Connecticut Gov. M. Jodi Rell said yesterday that she would allow the Nutmeg State's budget to become law without her signature.

In Harrisburg, a conference committee whose mission it is to craft a budget plan met for two hours yesterday in a mostly cordial discussion and broke agreeing to talk some more as the state entered its third month without a spending plan.

Rep. Dwight Evans (D., Phila.), chairman of the joint House-Senate conference committee, called the session useful, though the state doesn't appear any closer to reaching a budget compromise.

"It is always productive when you talk," Evans said as the six-member committee wrapped up the session at noon.

House Minority Leader Sam Smith (R., Jefferson) tried to break the logjam by offering a $27.5 billion fiscal blueprint that contains no new broad-based tax increases. It is the same as one offered by GOP members a month ago that never got a vote of the House because Democrats blocked its consideration.

Another conference committee member, Senate Majority Leader Dominic Pileggi (R., Delaware), said that GOP members who control the chamber were prepared to approve such a budget within a day if needed.

The committee took no formal action on the proposal yesterday.

Instead, Evans instructed legislative staff to draw up spreadsheets comparing Smith's plan with one offered by House Democrats. That plan calls for more than $28.1 billion in state spending and is built on the premise that the state must have at least $1.5 billion in new, unspecified revenue sources.

Evans, the House Appropriations Committee chairman, said the conference committee would meet again after that comparison is completed. He could not say when that would be, other than that it likely would be after Labor Day.

Yesterday marked only the third time the conference committee had met since the state blew its deadline of enacting a budget by the July 1 start of the fiscal year. It last convened a month ago and had made little progress toward solving the budget standoff since then.

Members appear as divided as ever - stuck over whether to raise taxes or reduce spending yet again.

Gov. Rendell and Democrats in both chambers are insisting that new revenue sources are required to cover needed increases in core governmental services such as education and health care. Republicans are dead set against imposing any new taxes in a recession, and instead favor additional spending cuts.

Also yesterday, officials reported that the state collected $1.6 billion in revenue in the month of August, or 1.2 percent less than expected.

Contact staff writer Mario F. Cattabiani at 717-787-5990 or mcattabiani@phillynews.com.

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