Sunday, February 28, 2016
Friday, February 26, 2016
Frustrated yet??????
Local school administrators gathered Tuesday to vent their frustrations about the state budget impasse, and sought ways to pressure elected officials to pass a budget quickly.
Nearly 60 school directors and administrators from 12 districts in Lawrence, Butler and Mercer counties met at the Midwestern Intermediate Unit IV in Grove City to discuss ways they could encourage legislators and the governor restore money to school districts.
The meeting was spearheaded by New Castle Superintendent John Sarandrea, after he blamed the eight-month impasse on state Rep. Mike Turzai at a recent New Castle Area School Board meeting.
Some school districts are getting near to closing their doors because they do not have the funds to operate, Nathan Mains, Pennsylvania School Board Association executive director, told the group.
Mains said he is not suggesting any school district close as a political statement. However, despite everyone’s best efforts, some districts are going to shut down because they are running out of money, “and they’re out of options.”
One of those is the Erie School District, where the board of education approved a $30 million line of credit during the budget impasse.
Mains pledged PSBA’s help in giving all of the districts statewide guidance in taking steps to get the attention of the legislature so that they see that things are in “crisis.”
DISTRICT-GENERATED
SUGGESTIONS
Suggestions bantered about at Tuesday’s session were:
•A barrage of phone calls to state legislators from school boards and administration and even parents, statewide.
•Using a snow day, statewide, as a protest day for a protest march in Harrisburg.
•Putting up billboards that blame the state legislature for the students’ lack of education this year, and that schools, conceivably, could close.
•School districts refraining from passing their own budgets in June with a lack of knowledge of how much in subsidies they will receive.
“Individually, it doesn’t seem to matter to the powers that be, that school districts are having a rough time,” commented Dr. Wayde Killmeyer, the IU IV executive director, who sponsored the meeting. The town hall idea was an outgrowth of discussions among superintendents with Killmeyer.
“From the people who set the budget, such as it is, to the governor, the attitude seems to be, ‘well, we sent 45 percent of the money, and the schools are all still open, so everything must be fine,’” Killmeyer said, “and we know that’s not true.”
Killmeyer said the state Department of Education on Monday sent a checklist to all intermediate unit directors for districts to follow, should it come to where a district will have to shut down this year due to the lack of funding. He said he is forwarding that to all 27 superintendents in the unit.
“There is no guidance in the school code about that, because this has never happened before,” he said.
Mains discouraged districts from pointing a finger at a particular legislator, such as New Castle superintendent John J. Sarandrea did with Republican Speaker of the House Mike Turzai at a recent school board meeting.
“They’re all at fault, they’re all to blame, nobody’s doing their jobs effectively, and our job is to get them all to say, ‘enough is enough,’” Main said.
He said that a recent survey by PSBA of school districts about the impact of the budget impasse garnered responses from 195 of 500 districts. Of those that responded, 35 districts already have seen their credit ratings negatively impacted, he said.
Twenty one percent of the districts said they eliminated professional development opportunities, and others have eliminated instructional materials and supplies.
“Four districts have said they only would be able to make it through (financially) to February,” he said.
He continued that 168 districts said they would be forced to raise property taxes, while 175 said they have filed plans to raise taxes above the index.
Twenty-seven percent of the responders said they are foregoing needed building maintenance, technology they wanted to launch, or expansion of kindergarten programs, Mains said.
Some districts are skipping payments — 29 percent cited charter school payments they’ve now dropped, 17 percent aren’t meeting their pension obligations, 14 percent are cutting vendor payments, and debt service is in that mix, he said. Of those districts that have received 45 percent of their funding, 68 percent used money to backfill money they’ve already spent, and 54 percent used those funds for payroll, Mains said.
“If people are telling you that you’ve got 45 percent, so you should be able to go forward ... this isn’t helping to keep schools open,” Means said. “It’s just paying the debt we ran up during the budget crisis. This is a bad situation.”
SHOULD DISTRICTS
PASS BUDGETS?
Mains noted that all school districts are expected to pass budgets before July 1.
“It is a part of your legal obligation,” he said, “but how do you do that if you have absolutely no idea what you’re going to be receiving from the state?”
Districts in the past could look to the previous year of funding, consistently, for a sense of where the funding would be the next year, Mains said.
But the state didn’t pass a budget this year, so “how will you make the assumption of what you’re getting from the state? We don’t have much advice on that at this point. I think you’re playing a guessing game.”
He said that PSBA is getting legal advice on whether districts, if faced with an inability to discern the state funding, would have to fulfill their obligation to pass the district budgets. He encouraged districts to also discuss that with their solicitors.
“You all fulfilled your obligation last year, but it may be little tricker this time,” he said.
Board members and administrators attending from Lawrence County represented the area school districts of New Castle, Wilmington, Shenango, Ellwood City and Union. Other districts represented were Jamestown, West Middlesex, Mercer, Commodore Perry, Butler Area, Sharon, Farrell and Greenville.
Thursday, February 18, 2016
Interested in a part time job and have no accountability ??
Public outrage over budget debacle doesn't translate into runs for state House or Senate seats
Ninety-three incumbents in the state House and Senate appear to have drawn no primary or general election challengers based on the Department of State's unofficial list of candidates for the April 26 primary election. (File photo/PennLive.com)
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on February 17, 2016 at 4:38 PM, updated February 18, 2016 at 7:31 AM
4 comments
BY JAN MURPHY & CHARLES THOMPSON
Despite coming off a year where a state budget never fully got finalized and the public grew increasingly dissatisfied with state officials over it, 185 state House members and 21 senators are planning to ask their constituents to re-elect them to another term of office.
What's more, 93 of them appear to face no primary or general election challenge at the moment based on the unofficial list of candidates who filed paperwork to get on the April 26 ballot by the Tuesday deadline.
But even more striking about the list of 373 candidates running for House seats and 47 seeking a Senate seat is Gov. Tom Wolf may be headed for some more rough waters ahead.
Looking at the number of legislative seats that would have to flip to Democratic hands, it appears Pennsylvanians will likely have to live with the divided government that brought us one of the longest budget impasses in state history for another two years.
Of the 25 Senate seats up for grabs, four Democratic incumbents and eight Republican incumbents have no opponents in either upcoming election in their bid for another four-year term, according to the candidate list from the Department of State.
Four seats – three that were held by Republicans and one held by a Democrat – are open due to resignation or retirements. That leaves only nine incumbents – seven Democrats and two Republicans – who face an opponent in their quest to hold on to their seat; four of those, all Democrats, face a challenge in the April 26 primary.
Given that the 18 Republican senators who are not up for election this year and the one open seat has only Republican candidates running for it, the GOP appears to be in good shape to at least retain majority control of that chamber if not build on their current 30-19 seat majority (with one vacancy).
Over in the House, all 203 seats are up for election to two-year terms. Republicans currently hold a 118-82 majority (with three vacancies).
Fifty-six Republican incumbents face no primary or general election challenge and 27 Democrats face no opposition.
Of the 18 seats that are open seats due to resignations and retirements, three seats feature only a Republican primary and another three are being pursued by only Democrats.
That appears to give Republicans a 59-30 edge at the moment.
From a caucus-wide standpoint, Democrats are not contesting 63 Republican seats and the Republicans are not contesting 43 Democratic seats.
The means there are 97 seats that are truly contested by both parties and Republicans would only need to win 39 of those seats to retain majority control. Conversely, Democrats would have to win 59 of those seats to flip control of the House.
Among the interesting races around the state are contests that involve three former House representatives – Jerry Birmelin, Kevin Haggerty, and Jesse White – who are seeking a return to the chamber. Birmelin, a Republican from Wayne County, retired in 2006. Democrats Haggerty of Lackawanna County and White of Washington County lost elections in 2014.
Also Democrat Vanessa Lowery Brown of Philadelphia, who faces charges for taking cash gifts from an uncover informant posing as a lobbyist in a legislative sting operation, is seeking re-election.
In the midstate, primary battles include:
- 87th state House District: On the Republican ballot, incumbent Greg Rothman will take on Michael Travis.
- 91st state House District: On the GOP ballot, incumbent Dan Moul will face a challenge from Kurt Holland .
- 92nd state House District: The Republican ballot for this open seat features Anthony Pugliese, Kraig Bruder, and Dawn Keefer.
- 101st state House District: Contesting for this open seat are Republicans Frank Ryan, Pier Hess, and Jeffrey Griffith.
- 102nd state House District: Incumbent Russ Diamond faces a challenge from Thomas Houtz on the Republican ballot.
- 104th state House District: Incumbent Sue Helm is being challenged by Nate Curtis on the Republican ballot.
- 106th state House District: Republicans battling it out for that party's nomination for this open seat are Tom Mehaffie and Jonathan Keeler.
- 13th state Senatorial District: Seeking the GOP nomination for this open seat are Scott Martin, Ethan Demme, and Neal Rice.
- 15th state Senatorial District: Seeking the Democratic nomination are incumbent Rob Teplitz and Alvin Taylor and vying for the Republican nomination of John DiSanto and Andrew Lewis.
- 31st state Senatorial District: Vying for the Republican nomination for this open seat are Jon Ritchie, Mike Regan, Scott Harper, and Brice Arndt.
Gone or not gone????
(Budget)Capitolwire: PA's structural deficit might not be gone for long, even if Wolf gets all his budget wants.
The Wolf administration assumes it will limit annual growth of human services spending to levels well below those predicted by the Independent Fiscal Office.
By Chris Comisac
Bureau Chief
Capitolwire
HARRISBURG (Feb. 17) - Gov. Tom Wolf last week devoted his budget address to lecturing state lawmakers, mostly the Republican ones, about the necessity of raising taxes to avoid a fiscal crisis in Pennsylvania.
On that same day, Wolf’s budget secretary did his own bit of lecturing to Capitol reporters, about the same subject, noting the administration hasn’t abandoned some of the policy proposals Wolf made in his first budget address. However, budget efforts need to be refocused at the deficit and education, so things like property tax relief and business tax reform had to be put on hold for the budget Wolf still wants in 2015-16, as well as the governor’s newly proposed FY2016-17 spending plan, said Budget Secretary Randy Albright during his pre-budget address briefing.
But after running through the need for $3.6 billion in new revenues from the current and coming fiscal year, and, during the same time frame, the $3.1 billion in spending beyond that included in the General Appropriations budget without Wolf’s partial veto of Dec. 29, Albright noted the budget deficit could return in FY2017-18.
That’s one year after tax revenues are increased by more than $2.7 billion under Wolf’s FY2016-17 plan with one of the primary goals being to address what the administration says is a coming $2.3 billion deficit (the state’s Independent Fiscal Office projects something closer to $1.9 billion, assuming revenues aren't found to balance the current year's budget).
Wolf’s 2016-17 budget proposal anticipates that if he gets everything for which he’s asking – and he claims a "fiscal catastrophe the likes of which we have never see awaits the commonwealth" if his plan isn’t enacted – the state will end nearly $9.1 million in the black. In FY2017-18, the administration estimates it will have about $6.2 million left over after paying all of its bills.
However, that’s due to a pretty hefty assumption, according to the Wolf administration.
“I believe Randy was saying that if we do not bend the cost curve for human services spending, so that it does not exceed half a billion dollars per year, we will have a structural budget deficit in 2017-18,” said Wolf spokesman Jeff Sheridan in an email.
And that assumption is clearly illustrated – on Page A2-6 - within the FY2016-17 executive budget document released last week by the administration.
The governor hopes to keep expenditure growth for the Department of Human Services to 4 percent or lower for FY2017-18 through FY2020-21, and in some cases, much lower. FY2017-18 assumes 4-percent growth in expenditures, FY2018-19 assumes 3.2-percent growth, and fiscal years 2019-20 and 2020-21 plan for 3.3-percent growth.
Gov. Wolf and his Human Services Department are looking at ways to try to control costs, with a good portion of those hopes tied to things like Medicaid expansion, long-term managed care and improving the availability and use of home- and community-based care.
But are those efforts capable of shaving enough off the department’s expenditure growth rate?
The Independent Fiscal Office in its most recent five-year outlook document, released in late January, projects human services expenditure growth of 5.7-percent per year through FY2020-21 (between $600 million and $800 million per year), when the IFO estimates the DHS General Fund expenditures would be a total of $15.3 billion. The Wolf administration anticipates their efforts will keep those General Fund expenditures to about $14.5 billion by the time FY2020-21 rolls around, or about $800 million less than projected by the IFO.
The IFO’s projections only incorporate current policy, and do not anticipate additional changes in coming fiscal years. So while Medicaid expansion is factored into their assumptions, none of the other efforts which have yet to be implemented by the Wolf administration are contemplated in the IFO predictions for DHS expenditures. Additionally, since the IFO figures reflect the General Appropriations budget partially-vetoed by Wolf, and not the “framework” agreement Wolf wants (and upon which his FY2015-16 and FY2016-17 budget figures are based), the IFO and the administration start off at different points regarding expenditures for the current and future years.
But if the Wolf administration isn’t successful with its policy implementation, or the implemented policies fail to perform as anticipated, the state could come up short of a balanced budget, solely because of DHS expenditure growth (that doesn't take into consideration other budgetary assumptions made by the administration), in each and every year, starting in FY2017-18.
If DHS expenditures in between FY2016-17 and FY2017-18 were to grow by the 5.9-percent rate assumed by the IFO, and not the 4-percent rate assumed by the administration, that could produce a difference of $239 million, and in out years, similar gaps could compound the potential deficit.
When made aware of the potential risk the administration is taking - assuming it can hold human services spending growth below $500 million annually - Sheridan responded: “We are going to continue trying to control costs, but this also makes it obvious we need new, sustainable revenue.”
Of course all this already assumes the governor gets a combined $3.6 billion in new revenue this year and next.
And those on the conservative side of things characterized the administration's estimates as rosy assumptions, and said the way to improve people’s lives isn't raising taxes and government spending.
“Typically we see human services grow between $400 million and $600 million each year,” said Senate Republican spokeswoman Jenn Kocher, adding that was before Medicaid expansion became a wildcard in predicting future human services costs. The IFO projects $100 million of added DHS expenditures in FY2016-17 are due to Medicaid expansion and Pennsylvania having to pay a portion of its cost (5 percent, which will grow to 10 percent by 2020) – see Page 38 of the IFO’s most recent five-year outlook document.
“It’s remarkable that less than a week out from the budget address the administration is saying that their 2017-18 planning numbers may not be in balance,” said Kocher. “It’s a little scary. It’s interesting that it appears that the administration is employing one of the so-called accounting ‘gimmicks’ that they spend so much time ridiculing.”
“It’s a curious question that requires an answer – are they going to need even more in taxes or will they cut some of the spending for which they have asked?” continued Kocher. “I guess the answer will really show us how they really view families and sending more of their money to Harrisburg through these tax and spend policies.
“It’s questions like this that will make the upcoming budget hearings more important than ever," she added.
“The Wolf Administration claims they want to ‘control costs,’ yet continue to not only propose, but actually increase spending,” said House GOP spokesman Steve Miskin. “It doesn’t make sense, and builds a deficit if left unchecked… which is what they want.”
“The bottom line is, this governor and his administration are driven to increase taxes on every Pennsylvania resident and employer and everything they do is aimed to make a case to increase taxes. It is what they seem to stand for,” said Miskin.
-30-
Wednesday, February 17, 2016
Is Pa headed for this?
The Kansas Supreme Court on Thursday gave the state until June 30 to enact an “equitable” school funding formula or, it said, the state’s public schools won’t open for the 2016-2017 school year.
In its ruling, the court said that if a formula isn’t in place by then, the court will decide that “no constitutionally valid school finance system exists.”
“Without a constitutionally equitable school finance system, the schools in Kansas will be unable to operate beyond June 30,” the Supreme Court said.
“Accordingly, the Legislature’s chosen path during the 2016 session will ultimately determine whether Kansas students will be treated fairly and the schoolhouse doors will be open to them in August for the beginning of the 2016-2017 school year,” the ruling stated.
The ruling affirms a Court of Appeals decision that the state had failed to correct constitutional inequities among school districts in the state’s school funding system. The three-judge appeals panel said the state’s block grant system had shorted poor school districts by $54 million.
The Legislature switched to a block grant system last year to replace a per-pupil funding formula until it could devise a new formula. But the court said block grants left schools underfunded.
Gov. Sam Brownback issued a statement reacting to the ruling: “Kansas has among the best schools in the nation, and an activist Kansas Supreme Court is threatening to shut them down. We will review this decision closely and work with the Legislature to ensure the continued success of our great Kansas schools.”
But Alan Rupe, an attorney for the school districts that challenged the block grant system, including Kansas City, Kan., public schools, was pleased with the decision.
“It’s a win for every kid in Kansas that attends public schools, particularly kids who are disadvantaged and in high poverty areas,” Rupe said.
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