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BUDGET HEARINGS BEGIN
The House and Senate Appropriations Committees commenced a three-week series of budget hearings on Feb. 22, giving an opportunity for state agencies to provide detail on the Governor's proposed FY 2016-2017 commonwealth budget, as well as the proposed supplemental funding for FY 2015-2016. Both the House and Senate began their hearings with an overview from Matthew Knittel, director of the state's Independent Fiscal Office, who told committee members Pennsylvania has been experiencing fairly solid growth. However, he also said the IFO is projecting that without any changes, the accumulated structural deficit in the state's budget by 2020 will be around $10 billion, as revenue is growing at a 3.7 percent rate while expenditures are increasing by 4.1 percent annually.
Several items of importance to counties have been discussed during the hearings to date. In particular, Department of Drug and Alcohol Programs Secretary Gary Tennis updated both committees on the opioid crisis, noting that the 2016 overdose numbers were continuing to trend worse than 2015. The Department is working to address this complex problem at many levels, which is going to require additional resources. Counties have also prioritized the issue for several years and are advocating additional treatment capacity as part of their 2016
priority on human services funding. In addition, state Attorney General Kathleen Kane shared that the prescription drug monitoring program created by Act 191 of 2014, another program supported by CCAP, has hired an outside contractor which will begin implementation around July 1. The Attorney General further told the committees that the office has requested $466,000 to supplement the special dedicated fund, generated from a surcharge on defendants, used to reimburse counties for 65 percent of the full-time district attorney salary. While a more robust fee was created in 2010 to increase the dollars coming into the account, and is ultimately expected to fully fund the state share, the Commonwealth remains in
arrears in meeting its reimbursement obligation to counties.
The Department of Aging discussed the new Community Health Choices program being rolled out in conjunction with the Department of Human Services. The program will implement a managed long-term care services and support program to deliver services for senior citizens and individuals with disabilities through capitated Medicaid managed care programs. The agencies issued a Request for Proposals on March 1, which is the first step in the process to select managed care organizations that will coordinate services.
Budget hearings with the Department of Human Services will be held on March 7 (Senate) and March 9 (House). A full schedule of budget hearings can be found on CCAP's Budget News and Updates web page and can be streamed live at www.pcntv.com.
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SECOND JUSTICE REINVESTMENT INITIATIVE LAUNCHED
On Feb. 18, Gov. Wolf, in partnership with legislative and judicial leaders, announced an extensive review of the Commonwealth's criminal justice system as part of a new Justice Reinvestment Initiative (JRI). The initiative is designed to reduce ineffective corrections spending and invest those savings in public safety strategies that have proven results.
Pennsylvania initiated its first JRI in 2012, which produced a decline in the prison population and significant cost savings that were then reinvested in areas such as enhanced public safety, victim's services, policing procedures, and local reentry strategies. Despite the impacts from these reforms, other drivers of incarceration and costs at both the state and local levels still need to be addressed. The second round of JRI will focus on the front end of the system, including sentencing and pre-trial policies. A working group of 35 representatives from all three branches of state government, local government (including counties) and other criminal justice stakeholders will work to develop policy options that could be introduced in the coming legislative session.
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HOUSE HOLDS MEETINGS ON CHESAPEAKE BAY REBOOT
Department of Agriculture Secretary Russell Redding and Department of Environmental Protection Secretary John Quigley appeared before an informational meeting of the House Agriculture and Rural Affairs, and Environmental Resources and Energy committees on Feb. 29 to provide additional details about the Chesapeake Bay reboot strategy.
The strategy is intended to improve water quality, and ultimately help the Commonwealth to meet specific target reductions in nitrogen, phosphorus and sediment loads going to the Bay. Sec. Redding noted that the Department of Agriculture oversees 33,000 farms in Pennsylvania, which are responsible for a significant piece of the nutrient reductions. As part of the reboot strategy, conservation districts across the Commonwealth will be required to perform 50 farm inspections per technician per year, rather than the 100 farm educational visits currently required. Sec. Quigley acknowledged that this is a shift in roles for the districts, but also explained that if districts decide not to participate in compliance inspections, the Department would withhold conservation district funding and use those dollars to hire individuals at the state level to carry out those inspections instead.
Dr. Richard Roush, Dean of Penn State's College of Agricultural Sciences, also discussed the College's commitment to engage in the reboot strategy, including leading an effort to survey 20,000 farmers to quantify conservation practice implementation in the Bay for which Pennsylvania has not received credit. Representatives of the Pennsylvania Conservation Districts Association and the
USDA Natural Resources Conservation Services provided additional perspective. All submitted comments can be found on the House Agriculture and Rural Affairs Committee
web page
.
In related news, the U.S. Supreme Court recently declined to hear a case challenging the Chesapeake Bay cleanup plan. The American Farm Bureau Federation filed the original case, arguing that the federal Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) overstepped its authority in leading the effort because only the states in the watershed had authority to manage the Bay. The Court's deferral lets stand a 2013 U.S. District Court ruling that EPA is within its rights to under the Clean Water Act to partner with the six Bay states to cut pollution.
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ONLINE VOTER REGISTRATION REACHES MILESTONE
The state's online voter registration system has logged nearly 100,000 applications in the first six months of operation, Pennsylvania Secretary of State Pedro Cortés announced recently.
To date, more than 97,800 Pennsylvanians have taken advantage of the new technology. About 60 percent of users registered for the first time, while the remaining 40 percent were voters making updates to their registration, such as a change of name, address or party affiliation.
Counties have supported online voter registration as a means of improving accuracy and efficiency for voters, and worked with the Department of State to assure the system, available at www.register.votespa.com, has appropriate security measures.
During the press event, Gerald Feaser, director of the Dauphin County Bureau of Registration and Elections said online voter registration has greatly reduced the amount of time spent processing paper applications and saves on mailing costs.
Secretary Cortés also announced recently that Pennsylvania has joined the national record-matching consortium Electronic Registration Information Center (ERIC). ERIC is a non-profit corporation governed by a board of directors composed of member states whose mission is assisting states to improve the accuracy of America's voter rolls and increase access to voter registration for all eligible citizens. Every 60 days, member states submit their voter registration data and limited information from motor vehicle records. All data is securely transferred and personal identification information is anonymized before and after it is submitted to the ERIC data center. ERIC compares the records among states and with data from the U.S. Postal Service and Social Security Administration. The data matching process helps to provide more accurate voter rolls, resulting in less returned mail and fewer provisional ballots on Election Day.
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JOINT CITY/COUNTY TASK FORCE ON OPIOID ABUSE
The National Association of Counties (NACo) and the National League of Cities (NLC) have created a joint task force on the opioid and heroin epidemic, charged with developing a coordinated approach to enhance awareness, facilitate peer exchange, and identify policy solutions. Erie County Executive Kathy Dahlkemper will be part of the effort, which will include a minimum of two national dialogues to explore the issues related to the crisis. The joint task force will also seek to develop educational opportunities, and will publish a national summary report of city-county collaboration that focuses on community prevention and overdose response, effective treatment options and public safety enforcement.
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TOOMEY AMENDMENT TO FIGHT OPIOID EPIDEMIC ADOPTED
The U.S. Senate recently adopted an amendment offered by Pennsylvania Senator Pat Toomey, and cosponsored by Pennsylvania Senator Bob Casey, to help cut down on inappropriate access to opioids. The amendment to the Comprehensive Addiction and Recovery Act (S. 524) is similar to policies already adopted by Medicaid and private insurers, and would prevent abuse of Medicare by stopping beneficiaries from going to numerous doctors and pharmacies to obtain multiple prescriptions and large quantities of opioids. Health experts, law enforcement and the Obama administration are backing the amendment.
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VOTING MATTERS
CCAP members will elect the two CCAP representatives to the NACo Board of Directors at the business meeting to be held during Tuesday's closing session of the CCAP Spring Conference. The Conference takes place March 13-15 at the Hilton Harrisburg, and features meetings of standing policy committees, numerous educational sessions and speakers including Gov. Wolf, Budget Secretary Randy Albright, DHS Secretary Ted Dallas, Department of Community and Economic Development Secretary Dennis Davin, and leaders of the four legislative caucuses.
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