{"id":20908,"date":"2014-02-20T16:17:20","date_gmt":"2014-02-20T21:17:20","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.unionvilletimes.com\/?p=20908"},"modified":"2014-02-20T16:17:20","modified_gmt":"2014-02-20T21:17:20","slug":"pennsylvania-deserves-better-than-kick-the-can","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.unionvilletimes.com\/?p=20908","title":{"rendered":"Pennsylvania deserves better than Kick-The-Can"},"content":{"rendered":"

To The Editor,<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"Letters1\"<\/a>We have a pension crisis in Pennsylvania. It was created by Governor Ridge and the legislature, when the passed Act 9 of 2001, then kicked down the road by Governor Rendell and the legislature for the 8 years that he was in office.\u00a0In 2011 the pension crisis was addressed by Act 120, a balanced bipartisan solution to a long-term problem that moves the state toward paying off the bill.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Now Gov. Corbett, in an effort to get reelected, has decided to kick that pension reform can down the road yet again, by taking funds dedicated to reducing the amount that the government should pay on this debt and using those funds elsewhere. This debt was accumulated during a decade of government underfunding which the legislature knew would have to be paid eventually and chose to ignore.\u00a0 In realistic terms, it is like paying the minimum amount on a credit card and spending wildly on gifts. This is not<\/b><\/i> fiscal responsibility. It\u2019s irresponsibility for what appears to be a re-election tactic.<\/p>\n

We need to ask exactly what new money is Gov. Corbett going to use to fund the things that he has promised in his budget proposal and is it sustainable funding?\u00a0 We know he is banking on hundreds of millions in savings for proposals that have yet to be approved, like his Medicaid plan. We know he\u2019s asking to cut funding to Emergency Services, Veterans needs and Natural Resources.\u00a0 We know he is also suggesting that we postpone nearly $400 million in payments to businesses that provide care to the disabled. Making only 11 payments in a fiscal year, instead of 12 to make it appear that there is money to be had. Granted this kind of slick accounting has been around in government for a long time, but that doesn\u2019t make it right. It\u2019s business as usual and it needs to stop. The people of Pennsylvania deserve honest accounting and fiscally responsible spending.<\/p>\n

Gov. Corbett and the legislature should be focusing on the long-term fiscal health of the state. We should be closing the corporate tax loopholes that allow more than 70% of businesses to avoid paying taxes.\u00a0 We should expand the federal Medicaid plan into Pennsylvania that would help struggling families and bring thousands of new jobs into Pennsylvania. We should also be creating a fair natural gas severance fee that is in line with other states and focus on growing good jobs in Pennsylvania.<\/p>\n

Can\u00a0this be accomplished?\u00a0 You bet it can!<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Susan Rzucidlo<\/strong><\/p>\n

Candidate, 158th House District<\/strong><\/p>\n

www.SusanforPA.com<\/strong><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

To The Editor, We have a pension crisis in Pennsylvania. It was created by Governor Ridge and the legislature, when the passed Act 9 of 2001, then kicked down the road by Governor Rendell and the legislature for the 8 years that he was in office.\u00a0In 2011 the pension crisis was addressed by Act 120, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":20907,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[122],"tags":[4444,968,124,666],"class_list":["post-20908","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-letters","tag-election-2014","tag-gov-tom-corbett","tag-pensions","tag-state-legislature"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unionvilletimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20908","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unionvilletimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unionvilletimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unionvilletimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unionvilletimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=20908"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.unionvilletimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20908\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unionvilletimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/20907"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unionvilletimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=20908"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unionvilletimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=20908"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unionvilletimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=20908"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}