Pa. adopts $50.8B budget that sends more money to poorest schools, skips difficult policy questions

Governor Josh Shapiro signed Pennsylvania's $50.8 billion state budget into law, allocating over $900 million to education and increasing pensions for retired public workers. The budget, finalized after a two-week delay, introduces a new regulatory requirement for data centers to report their annual energy and water consumption to the state.

Notably, the budget retains an existing sales tax break for qualifying data centers, despite recent bipartisan efforts to eliminate it. The legislative package was a compromise, omitting many ambitious policy proposals favored by Governor Shapiro and other Democrats, such as legalizing recreational marijuana and increasing the minimum wage.

Fiscal conservatives criticized the budget's use of accounting maneuvers, including delayed Medicaid payments, to avoid new taxes and preserve the state's nearly $8 billion rainy day fund. Some lawmakers expressed dissatisfaction over deferred debates on critical issues like energy costs, housing, and public transit, while the budget also excluded new recurring funding for mass transit and a private school voucher program, which had caused a major impasse in the previous year's budget negotiations.