PA Budget Approved; Here Are Highlights Of $50B Spending Plan

HARRISBURG, PA — After a nearly five-month stalemate that had caused public schools and social services agencies to go without funding, Pennsylvania lawmakers finally have approved a $50 billion 2025-26 state budget.

Gov. Josh Shapiro signed the various bills in the spending plan into law on Wednesday, 135 days after the budget was supposed to have been passed.

“Pennsylvania is on the rise, and this budget continues our progress, solving problems that Harrisburg has ignored for years, creating more opportunity for our students, workers, and businesses, and putting the Commonwealth on a path to sustained growth,” Shapiro said in a statement.

A key element in ending the lengthy deadlock was Democrats agreeing to Republican insistence they end attempts to make Pennsylvania the only significant fossil fuel-producing state to mandate power plant owners pay for their planet-warming greenhouse gas emissions.

The budget's highlights include:

• An overall increase in education funding totaling more than $900 million, including a $565 million increase in public school adequacy funding, $105 million for basic education funding and a $40 million increase for special education funding.

• The establishment of the Working Pennsylvanians Tax Credit - an earned income tax credit that will deliver $193 million in tax relief for working families equal to 10 percent of the federal credit.

• A $25 million child care recruitment and retention initiative and raising wages for direct care workers with a $21 million investment in their work.

• A $10 million boost in services for older Pennsylvanians and an $11 million increase for their food assistance programs.

Losers in the budget deal include state mass transit agencies, as the bill package did not include new funding for mass transit systems. That's bad news for all of them - but particularly so for Philadelphia's SEPTA and Pittsburgh Regional Transit, the state's two largest transit agencies that have been experiencing significant financial difficulties.

According to Shapiro's office, the budget will leave the state with a surplus of nearly $8 billion by the end of the fiscal year.