Tone deaf
Legislature continues wasteful spending Whether a $28 billion budget that could boost state borrowing by as much as $600 million qualifies as “balanced,” as required by Pennsylvania law, may be an exercise in semantics. But that’s the spending plan Gov. Ed Rendell signed last week, just six days late, not the 101 of last year.
Were those projects related to road construction/maintenance and bridge repair, we think you could make a good case for adding to the debt load. Those kinds of expenditures would certainly fall under a proper use of capital money, which Rendell said “can be spent to make investments that create jobs, that create orders for (building materials and manufacturing) that is important to keep our economy humming.”
But if roads and bridges are on the agenda, the governor isn’t saying much about them. Instead, among the projects he’s hand-picked for financing was the Arlen Specter Library at Philadelphia University for $10 million. This at a time when funding for a number of social services, which depend heavily on state support, is being cut drastically.
Remember, too, that this budget relies heavily on aid from Washington that may or may not be forthcoming. That’s another reason why this is hardly the time to be borrowing money to build a monument to a Pennsylvania politician.
Specter is a member of the 30-year club, having been first elected to the Senate in 1980. For all the good work he has done on behalf of Pennsylvanians, he may be best remembered for his Democrat-to-Republican-to-Democrat party dance, the latter move in 2009 a blatant attempt to retain his seat when he faced the prospect of defeat in this year’s Republican Senate primary. He lost anyway, in the Democratic primary, bringing a likely end to his long political career next January.
We’re sure Specter has plenty of supporters. But even if you’re a fan, how do you justify borrowing a pile of money to build a public edifice in his honor when the state – even with a new budget in hand – remains in precarious financial shape? As difficult as this budget was, next year’s could be even more challenging.
This kind of spending – along with the $100 million that legislative leaders negotiated into the budget for their own pet programs – is both selfish and self-serving and creates even more financial obligations that ultimately will fall to the taxpayers.
As bad as things get, these people we’ve elected to serve in Harrisburg just never get the message.
Bucks County Courier Times