How the clash over school vouchers left the Pa. budget in a standstill

HARRISBURG — Pennsylvania’s budget was approved late Wednesday, with no celebratory bill signing or brouhaha.

Instead, the state will likely stay in a budget standstill for the summer – and could eventually fail to pay its bills, depending on how long the stalemate lasts.

Gov. Josh Shapiro announced Wednesday that he would line-item veto a controversial school voucher program in the state’s $45.5 billion spending plan he negotiated with Senate Republicans. He said the veto was necessary to avoid being “plunged into a painful, protracted budget impasse while our communities wait.”

The Senate GOP immediately accused Shapiro of reneging on his agreement with them and caving to teacher’s union pressures, and thus, continuing the stalemate between the state’s top leaders.

The state Senate and House already passed the spending bill. But the Senate must complete the routine task of signing the measure during a legislative session day before it can go to Shapiro for his signature.

But that was before Shapiro said he’d veto the school voucher program he helped create — a program that Senate Republicans said they wanted in exchange for some of Shapiro’s own budget priorities.

The state Senate is not scheduled to reconvene until Sept. 18, and a spokesperson for the top Senate Republican said President Pro Tempore Kim Ward has no intention of recalling members before that.

However, Shapiro rejected the notion that he ever had made a final deal with Senate Republicans that included the vouchers, in a news conference Thursday. Instead, he laid blame on Senate Republicans for failing to reach an agreement with their House Democratic colleagues. And he put the onus on both parties to come together and figure it out.

“[Senate Republicans] made a unilateral decision to send this bill over to the House,” Shapiro said. “They may not like how this process played out, but it is the process that they put into effect because of their inability to close the deal with the House Democrats.

Senate GOP leaders believed Shapiro’s support of their spending plan would “translate into agreement” with House Democrats, once he and Senate leaders reached a deal, Senate Majority Leader Joe Pittman (R., Indiana) said in a statement. Senate Republicans advanced the $45.5 billion spending plan last week, praising Shapiro for his work on the budget with them.

Their tune changed on Wednesday, after Shapiro announced he would veto their top priority — private-school vouchers — and instead that House Democratic leaders would in the future work to add a school voucher program or add to existing tax credit programs.

“The truth is, there was a deal, regardless of what Gov. Shapiro says publicly, and he knows there was a deal,” Ward said in a statement on Thursday.

Shapiro refuted Ward’s characterization that there was ever a final deal.

“There was never a deal between all three parties, and that was acknowledged by all parties, privately and publicly,” Shapiro added. “They now need to get in a room with the House Democrats and they need to learn to work together.”

Shapiro could still avoid a budget impasse if he doesn’t veto the school voucher program after all, Ward said.

“Gov. Shapiro can still deliver on his campaign promise to Pennsylvania to give ‘every child of God a chance to have a good education,’” Ward said, quoting Shapiro’s appearance last month on Fox News in support of a private-school voucher program.

Even if the Senate came back into session to allow the spending bill to go to Shapiro’s desk, neither chamber has advanced the necessary code bills that provide instructions for how the state can spend its money.

At worst, this means the state can’t spend any of its money. At best, some of the new budget items that Shapiro championed won’t happen, and the money will sit unspent in the state Treasury Department until next year.