Some of the proposals in Wolf’s budget address had already been rolled out. But one new proposal is to take money for racehorse development and put it into a tuition assistance program for students at Pennsylvania’s state-owned universities.
"I’m proposing a historic $200 million investment in scholarships," he said.
One proposal announced last week would make school lead and asbestos clean-up projects eligible for up to $1 billion in state redevelopment assistance grants.
But Jake Corman, leader of the Senate Republican majority, says details of the proposal will be key.
"A lot of schools looked at it as, ‘wait, we already did that. And now you’re going to punish us by giving it for free for some other schools who didn’t plan like we did.’ So is it going to all schools?" Corman said.
While the governor is again proposing more money for public education, he’s also proposing charter school reforms that would save $280 million a year. And while there are no proposed increases in the sales tax or personal income tax, Wolf wants corporate net income tax reforms that would bring in another $250 million in the next fiscal year.
He also spent several minutes making a fresh appeal for measures to address gun violence. He spoke of an "empty seat" in the House chamber, where the speech is delivered, an empty seat he suggested was symbolically reserved for a young man who was an innocent victim caught in the crossfire on the streets of Erie.
Wolf appealed to responsible, law-abiding gun owners.
"Imagine that it’s your gun that’s stolen from your house by someone who is neither responsible nor law-abiding. Imagine it’s your gun that through no fault of your own gets resold to someone who couldn’t pass a background check," he said.
Shortly after the governor’s address, the chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, Republican Rob Kauffman, issued a statement saying he was "disappointed" Wolf used his budget speech to, as Kauffman put it, "advocate for abridging the Second Amendment rights of law-abiding gun owners."