Thursday, Republican Party of Pennsylvania Chairman Val DiGiorgio was joined by State Senators John DiSanto and Scott Martin to call on Governor Tom Wolf to tell Pennsylvanian’s what his education plan is and how he plans to achieve his goal of putting all basic education dollars through the Basic Education Funding Formula without raising taxes by billions of dollars.
“Tom Wolf has vetoed more education dollars than he’s signed, particularly singling out state basic education funding for vetoing during the 2015 budget impasse. Even worse, Tom Wolf has held public schools hostage while he pushed for billions of taxes,” said Chairman DiGiorgio.
“Now, Tom Wolf has not shown Pennsylvanians what his education plan is, only saying he wants billions more to run through the fair funding formula. It’s time for Tom Wolf to answer: What is your education plan and how will you achieve it without raising taxes?”
Sen. DiSanto noted that Tom Wolf has not moved the ball forward on education since taking office.
“Under Tom Wolf’s watch, teacher pension benefit spending has increased by 115 percent, while basic education funding has only increased by ten percent. Even in my first year in office, I saw the governor self-create a major budget impasse as a result of his desire to seek more taxes,” he said.
“Other than tax and spend, the Governor, who is more than happy to take shots at others trying to fix the system, has never created an education plan of his own.”
Sen. Martin added that taxing Pennsylvanians by billions in order to fund schools is not the best way to achieve equity.
“It seems like Tom Wolf’s plans for his second term are exactly like they were for his first term: increasing taxes by the billions so as to cater to special interests,” he stated.
“While we might all agree our school funding could use more equity, a multi-billion tax increase is no way to get there.”
The press conference can be viewed in its entirety HERE.
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