“Big increase in Medicaid
Shapiro’s $51.5 billion plan for the 2025-2026 fiscal year beginning July 1 would increase total authorized spending by 9% for state operations, or about $3.8 billion, including a $230 million request for the current year’s spending.
Of that, $2.5 billion would go to an increase in Medicaid spending, owing partly to a miscalculation in the cost to care for unexpectedly sick people remaining on the state’s Medicaid rolls after the COVID-19 pandemic.
Lawmakers can delay the inevitable increase for a year by, say, low-balling the Medicaid appropriation or postponing a big reimbursement bill to providers, like hospitals or counties…
Human services providers
Nursing home operators, home-care providers and counties that run mental health services are hoping for substantial increases in aid that Shapiro didn’t include in his proposal.
The biggest request is from agencies that dispatch home care workers to care for the roughly 150,000 to 200,000 people who qualify for Medicaid-funded home care.
The Pennsylvania Homecare Association is seeking a 10% increase, or $370 million more. Meanwhile, more than 100,000 shifts are going unfilled each month in Pennsylvania because the relatively low wages make it difficult to attract workers, Haney said…
Transit aid
Shapiro is seeking an extra $283 million, or about 20% more, for public transit agencies as he works to stave off cutbacks by transit agencies struggling to regain ridership lost during the pandemic.
Democrats support it. The trade-offs sought by Republicans are adding money for highway projects and funding it with a new source of cash, such as tax revenue from skill games.
Talks in Pennsylvania are at crunch time over a budget, legalizing marijuana and taxing skill games