Every elected official has good causes they would like to pursue and good ideas to get off the ground that are restrained by two things. First, you need the money to accomplish the task. Second, doing so has to be part of your job.
Gov. Tom Wolf has problems with both of these when it comes to his push for state workers to be vaccinated.
A state’s chief executive absolutely should brainstorm ways to encourage vaccination during a pandemic, especially one that has had such a profound effect on the economy. But is offering state employees five paid days off the way to do it?
Let’s start off looking at the money for that proposition. One could think it has little cost. You aren’t giving people money; you’re giving them time. Except that’s not true. You’re giving them money so they can have time. Oh, and if they don’t have the ability to take the days off, they still get the pay.
Pennsylvania Treasurer Stacy Garrity said that if you multiply the cost of those five days across the 70,000 state employees, you get a cost of $100 million. That is a massive amount of money for the governor to greenlight seemingly out of the blue on Monday.
Where exactly does the state get an extra $100 million and what else could that money have been funding? Is there really that much unused cash sitting stockpiled and, if so, couldn’t it be used for education or senior care or housing or just to stop the incessant turnpike toll increases?
But that’s where we get into the second issue. Is ponying up that much money the governor’s job?
Sure, as the state’s highest executive, running the government is his responsibility. The Legislature, however, has the job of not just making the laws but deciding how the money gets spent. Wolf definitely knows this — or he should after multiple budget face-offs with Senate President Pro Tempore Jake Corman, R- Centre.
Spending $100 million is something that should go in front of the Legislature. Even if one wholeheartedly supports the governor’s vacation day plan, there is a right way to do it and a wrong way, and doing it without legislative input is outside the lines.
This isn’t about just picking a Democratic or Republican position. Bringing something to the Legislature means opening the floor for debate. It means both sides have to bring their best arguments to bear and have discourse in the public arena. That always is for the best interest of the people.
Nothing good comes from money matters being decided in darkness. That recently was a hot topic when the question of how to refund unemployment compensation overpayments came to light after an error five years ago. The cost there is $19.4 million — less than a fifth of the cost of the vaccination days off.
Wolf needs to do his job, and part of that job is presenting a plan like this to the Legislature before he announces it as policy.
— The Tribune-Review/TNS
