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HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) — A top Pennsylvania Republican senator suggested Tuesday that Democratic Gov. Tom Wolf will need to accept changes to a bipartisan budget agreement if he wants to get it past opposition in the House of Representatives and end a 7-month-old fight.
The comments by Senate Majority Leader Jake Corman, R-Centre, came as the Republican-controlled Senate returned to the Capitol for its first voting session of 2016, and Wolf hits the one-year mark in his administration.
After a bipartisan budget deal collapsed in the House late last month, Wolf's administration had suggested he was done negotiating.
"If the House isn't on board, they're not on board," Corman said Tuesday. "We've got to get them on board somehow. We need to have discussions and get there. None of us taking our marbles and going home is going to get this resolved."
In a statement Tuesday, the Wolf administration said Republican majority leaders in the House and Senate should allow votes on the bipartisan budget deal.
On Tuesday, Wolf said he still supports the bipartisan deal and does not believe it is dead. He also seemed to suggest that he is open to changes, if necessary.
"We have to get this right and whether it's exactly the way the compromise was before the holidays or something slightly different, I believe we are making progress toward a budget that is in balance and that actually addresses the needs of Pennsylvania," he told reporters during a public appearance in Harrisburg.
That deal called for a $30.8 billion spending package, a 6 percent increase, and a tax increase of more than $1 billion to deliver a record boost in public school aid and to help close a long-term deficit.
It continues to have the backing of Senate leaders, but House Republican leaders turned against it amid conservative opposition. Still, the Wolf administration believed it had rounded up enough support from Democrats and moderate Republicans to pass the House.
Two key problems dogged the deal.
Legislation for the tax increase never materialized, and it remained unclear whether Senate Republicans could resolve differences over elements of the tax package with supportive House members.
Also, Senate GOP legislation to restructure public pension benefits failed in the House. House Democrats voted as a bloc against it, despite Wolf's support, and many conservatives turned against it in what many viewed as an effort to help defeat the wider bipartisan budget agreement.
With lawmakers rushing to leave town for Christmas, the Republican-controlled Senate sent Wolf the main appropriations bill in a last-ditch, $30.3 billion budget package that had been written by House GOP majority leaders.
Wolf signed $23.4 billion of it, calling it emergency funding to prevent schools from closing and social service agencies from laying off more workers. However, Wolf vetoed billions for public schools to keep pressure on the Republican-controlled House to pass the bipartisan deal.
Discussions are slow, Corman said, and top Democrats accuse House Republicans of dragging their feet. The timeline to settle the remaining details is unclear, and talks could pick up if schools warn that they're running out of money.
Banks may be less willing than last fall to loan money to school districts since Wolf broke the stalemate by signing a budget bill, Corman said.
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