Last week Governor Tom Corbett presented his proposed 2014-15 budget to the General Assembly. The $29.4 billion proposal includes the governor’s priorities in education, jobs, and health and human services. The budget address capped off months of preparation by the governor’s Office of the Budget, which included reviewing agency budget requests, preparing funding recommendations for the governor, and the crafting the final proposal.
Now it is the legislature’s turn to review not only the financial aspects of the budget proposal, but the programmatic and policy aspects as well. Beginning this week, the House and Senate appropriations committees will hold hearings on the spending proposals of each state agency. At those hearings, agency leaders will answer questions and provide information to its members. Click here http://www.legis.state.pa.us to see the schedules for both the House and the Senate. There are three to four hearings every day for the next several weeks.
This year, the House has also offered an opportunity for the general public to submit budget questions through its budget-related website, which can be found here: http://www.pabudget.com/participation.aspx
Once the hearings are complete, the House and Senate may each introduce a General Appropriation bill, although only one will be enacted as the final state budget. Once one chamber passes a General Appropriations bill, it will be sent to the other chamber for debate, possible amendment, and passage. If the bill is amended, it will be sent to the originating chamber for a concurrence vote. If the originating chamber does not concur in the amendments made by the second chamber, a conference committee may be convened. Three members from each chamber will be appointed to the committee, which will issue a conference committee report (compromise bill). The report of the conference committee is not subject to amendment and must be passed by a simple majority of each chamber. Once finally passed by each chamber, the bill will be presented to the governor for his signature. At this point, the governor has three options—he may sign the bill, veto the bill, or do a line-item veto. A line-item veto allows the governor to strike any appropriation he believes excessive or unnecessary. If the governor chooses either veto option, it may be overridden by a two-thirds majority vote in each chamber.
The final step of the budget process is the signing of the appropriations bills and revenue bills by the governor. It is important to note that in Pennsylvania, the budget is constitutionally required to be passed by June 30 and it must be balanced.