5 Takeaways From Gov. Shapiro's First Budget Address

HARRSIBURG, PA — Gov. Josh Shapiro's first-ever budget address was Tuesday morning. It was unsurprisingly met with rousing applause from the establishment figures in his party that helped spur his election, and with skepticism from some Republicans and from those farther on the left who did not think many of his proposals went far enough.

The budget cuts taxes in some places, while increasing spending in others. With a Democratic state legislature in power for the first time in recent history, this budget is unlikely to undergo the long and divisive debates that characterized so many of Gov. Tom Wolf's budgets.

Here are five preliminary takeaways from the speech:

No mention of climate change

Gov. Shapiro wholly avoided mentioning climate change during his budget address, pointing to methane leaks from abandoned wells while declining to address industrial pollution or the larger systemic issues that environmentalists agree are driving a planetary crisis.

Shapiro said the state should use "as much federal funding as possible" to cap abandoned wells. The governor said that he had "seen some of those wells myself. I’ve taken a zippo lighter – made right in Bradford by the way – and watched a big fire ball go up.

There are an estimated 700,000 of these wells in Pennsylvania. Shapiro's proposed use of federal funding would cap a mere 50 of them, a coalition of environmental advocacy groups estimated. Moreover, State Rep. Greg Vitali said that the underfunded Department of Environmental Protection needs more staff to even apply for funding in the first place.

"DEP needs more personnel to put out contracts for the plugging of these wells and to oversee the work performed," Vitali said in January, urging Shapiro to prioritize DEP in his budget.

Beyond the conspicious absence of the words "climate change," Shapiro's address also made no mention of fracking, toxic oil and gas waste, methane leaks from underground storage facilities, and reform of state environmental agencies which both grassroots organizations and state lawmakers say have been chronically underfunded and understaffed.

Billion dollar increase for education

In the wake of concerns during last fall's gubernatorial race that a potential Gov. Doug Mastriano would devastate public education — some estimated his proposals would have laid off half of all employees in public schools — Gov. Shapiro has taken a strong step in the opposite direction.

His budget calls for about a billion dollars in education funding, addressing lingering concerns from lawmakers and lobbyists regarding the teacher shortage, school safety, health, and equity. Specifically, $570 million would be earmarked for basic education, $100 million for special education, $100 million for public school building repair, and $100 million to continue the school safety grant program.

"Our schools should prepare students for the future and give them the freedom to chart their own course," Shapiro said. "If they want to go to college, we should make it more affordable. If they want to go straight into the workforce, we should make sure they have the skills and opportunities to be successful and provide for their families."

The budget calls for universal free breakfast in schools, which was introduced under Gov. Tom Wolf but did not have funding to continue into the future without legislative action. Lawmakers had previously pushed for both free breakfast and lunch, but lunch is not included in the governor's budget. Advocates had pushed for lunch due to the increasing pressures of inflation on top of the pandemic.

"With the challenges of the pandemic persisting and families facing higher costs across the board, now is not the time to take a step backwards – especially when the estimated cost to feed every student in Pennsylvania would be a small fraction of our overall budget," State Rep. Emily Kinkead (D-Allegheny) said in a co-sponsorship memorandum in February.

Still, Shapiro's education budget was largely well received.

"The governor’s budget proposal puts public education at the very top of his priority list," Pennsylvania State Education Association President Rich Askey said. "Public school students, parents, educators, and support professionals need his support to address the challenges they face. His budget plan shows that they have it.”

Teacher, police, and nurse shortage

Separate from his massive education budget, the governor followed through on what he promised last week when he announced support for addressing the teacher shortage, along with efforts to recruit more nurses and police officers.

"None of this (education spending) will work if we don’t have enough well-qualified, well-paid teachers in our classrooms, he said. "We’re going to give new teachers a tax break and more resources in their classrooms, so that they can help our students succeed."

Three years of up to $2,500 a year in tax incentives would be offered to newly certified teachers, nurses, and police officers.

Pennsylvania is now facing a 65 percent annual decline in new educators joining the workforce. According to lawmakers who plan to introduce a bill to address the issue, in 2010, Pennsylvania had about 20,000 new teachers certified each year.

However, Shapiro's budget did not call for the mandatory salary increases that advocates have said is so crucial. Askey said the PSEA "would need time" to review the full tax break proposal.

“We really believe that we need to focus on a state-funded effort to increase minimum salaries for education professionals, including educators, school counselors, and nurses, to $60,000 annually within five years and to set a minimum wage of $20 an hour for education support professionals, such as paraprofessionals, bus drivers, and cafeteria workers," he said.

The teacher shortage was already listing toward crisis before the pandemic, and shortages in healthcare and law enforcement that were made critical by the impacts of COVID-19.

Hydrogen and clean energy claims

The U.S. Department of Energy has plans for between seven and 10 "hydrogen hubs," or a connection of infrastructure and multiple hydrogen producers within a small area. Gov. Shapiro is in talks to have up to three of those hubs in Pennsylvania. He only briefly mentioned his pursuit of these hubs during his budget address, but he did tout hydrogen as a focus of his administration.

"We stand on the precipice of a major opportunity for energy and tech jobs – and Pennsylvania must lead the way by securing at least one regional hydrogen hub," he said. "My administration supports Pennsylvania’s applicants, and we want the future of hydrogen to come through our Commonwealth."

Absent of significant movement on climate change and other environmental issues, some said that the governor was attempting to position hydrogen as his green agenda, even though it is anything but.

A federation of renewable energy and climate change grassroots groups, the Better Path Coalition, expressed strong disapproval of Shapiro's words. They were specifically concerns with Shapiro's focus on hydrogen energy, which is known to cause methane leaks in the air that can often more than cancel out positive climate impacts.

"In a budget address that was absent of any strong initiatives to address the accelerating climate crisis, his statements supporting hydrogen were the most revealing of his lack of seriousness on the matter," the group said moments after the address concluded.

Blue hydrogen hub plans are "costly, unproven, and significantly less effective than other means of reducing climate-warming carbon emissions," researchers with the Ohio River Valley Institute found, largely due to their methane leaks.

Eliminating cell phone tax

Shapiro's budget slashes two taxes that Pennsylvanians would no longer see on their cell phone bills if his budget is passed as is: the gross receipts tax and the sales and use tax.

These taxes are placed on the service provided by wireless providers, and typically amounts to about 11 percent of every cell phone bill.

"In today’s world, practically everyone has a cell phone – and being connected to the rest of the world is critical to economic stability, safety, family and success," Shapiro said. "By eliminating the cell phone tax, we will save Pennsylvanians 124 million dollars every year."

Shapiro's full budget address can be watched online here and details of the proposed budget have been organized here.