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Santa is everywhere at this time of year — even behind the wheel of an LCTA bus

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Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Penguins hire Clark Donatelli as new head coach

<p>WILKES-BARRE &#8212; The state budget mess is getting messier and legislators are running out of patience, as the battle to get an agreement grows uglier by the day.</p><p>On Tuesday, Gov. Tom Wolf blamed House Republican leaders for Pennsylvania state government&#8217;s nearly record-long budget stalemate ahead of another battle over what kind of spending plan the GOP-controlled House of Representatives will support.</p><p>Wolf said Republicans &#8220;inexplicably blew up a bipartisan budget deal&#8221; that House GOP leaders had helped negotiate.</p><p>Wolf is threatening to veto an 11-month emergency spending package being advanced by House Republican leaders. They say it&#8217;s the responsible thing to do while negotiations continue.</p><p>Local legislators said they aren&#8217;t too happy about what they described Tuesday as political posturing at taxpayers&#8217; expense.</p><p>&#8220;When will obstinate partisans in the legislature &#8212; Democrat and Republican &#8212; come to understand there are no political victories to gain in this perpetual budget impasse, only continued pain for every taxpayer whose tired of a state government that doesn&#8217;t work for them anymore?&#8221; asked state Sen. John Yudichak, D-Plymouth Township.</p><p>He went on to say that along with his Democrat and Republican colleagues in the Senate, he has supported a responsible state budget and voted to &#8220;reel in unsustainable state pension systems&#8221; that are driving up school property taxes and &#8220;eating away&#8221; at the state&#8217;s credit rating at an alarming rate.</p><p>&#8220;In the budget that passed the Senate, pain was shared and progress was shared on investments in our businesses, communities and schools,&#8221; Yudichak said. &#8220;Taxpayers demand, deserve and should be delivered a fiscally responsible, bipartisan state budget.&#8221;</p><p>House Republicans two weeks ago rejected a 6 percent spending increase as part of the bipartisan budget deal, but Wolf says he now has secured enough votes in the House to pass it.</p><p>According to an Associated Press story Tuesday afternoon, there were signs of a potential breakthrough in Pennsylvania&#8217;s budget stalemate just three days before Christmas.</p><p>According to the AP story:</p><p>&#8226; The House of Representatives defied Republican majority leaders Tuesday and narrowly sent a bipartisan spending bill over a key procedural hurdle.</p><p>&#8226; The bill has Gov. Wolf&#8217;s backing to end a nearly six-month stalemate. The spending bill&#8217;s already passed the Republican-controlled Senate and the House could send it to Wolf&#8217;s desk as early as Wednesday.</p><p>&#8226; The main appropriations bill in a $30.8 billion spending package survived a series of procedural votes. Moderate Republicans joined Democrats to form a 100-97 majority on the final vote.</p><p>&#8226; The parliamentary maneuvers also defeated GOP leadership&#8217;s short-term spending proposal that Wolf had threatened to veto.</p><p>&#8226; However, other major elements of the bipartisan budget deal remain in limbo, including legislation restructuring pension benefits and authorizing a $1 billion-plus tax increase.</p><p>Meanwhile, state Rep. Eddie Day Pashinski, D-Wilkes-Barre, expressed concern at the lack of an agreement.</p><p>&#8220;Countless days continue to slip off the calendar as we inch closer to 2016,&#8221; Pashinski said. &#8220;Pennsylvania remains without a budget. The House intended to spend the weekend in session to finally pass a budget that is nearly six months overdue. However, after the House rejected a poorly designed pension bill by a 149-52 margin, the House Republicans took their football and went home.&#8221;</p><p>Pashinski said that more than a month ago Wolf, along with the Senate Democrats and Republicans and House Democrats and Republicans, agreed to a budget framework that would provide an additional $350 million dollars in education, increase funding for human service providers, begin to eliminate the debt and move Pennsylvania in the right direction.</p><p>&#8220;But once again, House Republicans decided to back out of this agreement and come up with another plan that falsely claims to appropriately move Pennsylvania out of debt,&#8221; Pashinski said.</p><p>Pashinski took issue with the Republican &#8220;claim to fame&#8221; to pass state budgets on time without tax increases.</p><p>&#8220;The truth is their slick maneuvers have forced local communities to shoulder the financial burden of funding the needs of their schools and human services,&#8221; Pashinski said. &#8220;They passed the buck to our local communities to deal with their problems by providing inadequate state support.&#8221;</p><p>Pashinski said the GOP &#8220;manipulation of the system&#8221; has wasted time and taxpayer money and caused great harm to those in need.</p><p>&#8220;Their actions are reckless and irresponsible,&#8221; he said. &#8220;Enough. House Republicans need to join the other three caucuses and the governor to pass a real budget now.&#8221;</p><p>On Monday, Wolf announced he would veto the House Republican stopgap budget if it reached his desk. He urged everyone to get back to work to pass a full-year budget now that invests in education, is balanced and begins to fix the deficit.</p><p>Wolf listed some of the consequences of the House Republican stopgap budget:</p><p>&#8226; The furlough of 8,000 commonwealth employees with the biggest impact on corrections, probation and parole and the state police.</p><p>&#8226; $455 million cut to our schools, compared to the previous year.</p><p>&#8226; $47.5 million cut to county human service programs.</p><p>&#8226; $100 million cut to Home and Community Services, denying more than 2,150 individuals with disabilities and autism the opportunity to remain in their homes.</p><p>&#8226; $8 million cut to vocational rehabilitation, which will lead to the forfeiture of $30 million in federal funding.</p><p>&#8220;A stopgap budget does not change the status quo that Harrisburg has accepted for too long,&#8221; a Wolf news release stated. &#8220;It does not restore funding to our schools and it does not begin to fix our deficit.&#8221;</p><style>
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<div class="neCaption">Pashinski </div></div><div class="metaInfo"><photo0>https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/12/web1_Pashinski-3.jpg</photo0><caption0>Pashinski </caption0><photoCredit0></photoCredit0></div><div class="neFile"><img class="neImage" src="https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/12/web1_Yudichak-John.jpg">
<div class="neCaption">Yudichak </div></div><div class="metaInfo"><photo1>https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/12/web1_Yudichak-John.jpg</photo1><caption1>Yudichak </caption1><photoCredit1></photoCredit1></div><div class="neFile"><img class="neImage" src="https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/12/web1_Wolf-2.jpg">
<div class="neCaption">Wolf </div></div><div class="metaInfo"><photo2>https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/12/web1_Wolf-2.jpg</photo2><caption2>Wolf </caption2><photoCredit2></photoCredit2></div></div>
<div class="metaInfo"><bylineMeta><p>By Bill O&#8217;Boyle</p><p>boboyle@www.timesleader.com</p></bylineMeta></div><div class="metaInfo"><shirttailMeta><p>Reach Bill O&#8217;Boyle at 570-991-6118 or on Twitter @TLBillOBoyle.</p></shirttailMeta></div>

Local legislators getting tired of the rhetoric in state budget impasse