Why is the pa budget being stretched into the month of August?
Another year, another missed deadline. In what has become a familiar storyline in the Capitol, the Rendell administration and the legislature are starting the new fiscal year today without a state budget completed on time. And today is just Day One of what is expected to be at least a weeks-long delay in finding common ground on a spending plan for the fiscal 2009-2010 year. Gov. Rendell said yesterday that he did not believe a budget could be negotiated by the end of this week – or even by the end of next week. “Because of the financial condition of the country, and for that matter, globally, this is a very tough budget,” the governor told reporters. But, he pointed out yesterday, he has presented a balanced budget to the legislature. The problem is, Republicans – and even some Democrats – don’t like some of its proposals, namely the governor’s call for a temporary, 16 percent increase in the state’s personal-income tax. “And I understand that,” the governor said yesterday, “and I und
