Gov. Wolf passes Pa. budget

Gov. Tom Wolf agreed today to allow the 2015-2016 budget to pass, ending a nearly nine-month-long budget impasse. The $6.6 billion budget was created by a Republican-controlled Congress, to feature no-new-taxes spending.

The bill will become law Sunday night.

Wolf was reluctant to sign the bill, but said he would allow it to pass earlier today during a press conference.

“This budget doesn’t work,” Wolf said during the press conference. “The math doesn’t work and that’s a real problem.”

“So I cannot in good conscience sign this bill I cannot in good conscience attach my name to a budget that simply does not add up,” he added. “But to allow us to move on to face budget challenges of 2016-17 I am going to allow HB1801 to become law.”

The budget will have a commonwealth allocation of $147 million, a 5 percent increase from the 2014-2015 budget, President Theobald said in a university statement. An additional $26 million will be allocated to Temple Health enterprises.

The lack of budget threatened a $175 million deficit for Temple and other closures throughout the state.

Theobald applauded the Temple community for more than 5,000 emails and hundreds of calls from students, faculty and alumni to put pressure on the state government for a budget and to avoid a deficit.

You let your voices be heard in Harrisburg and made a difference,” Theobald said in the statement.

Temple Advocates Legislative Outreach Network had been lobbying for the passage of a budget so the university would not have a large deficit.

Gillian McGoldrick can be reached at gillian.mcgoldrick@temple.edu or on Twitter @gill_mcgoldrick.