HARRISBURG (TNS) — Pennsylvania’s $45.2 billion will bring hundreds of millions of new dollars to southwestern Pennsylvania, with record investments in education and public safety — and a sizable corporate tax cut.

The budget, signed by Gov. Tom Wolf on Friday, was lauded by industry groups across the state — from education, to business, to health care. Lawmakers in the GOP-controlled General Assembly overwhelmingly passed it Friday before sending it to Mr. Wolf’s desk. The balanced budget was completed eight days after its constitutional deadline.

The budget is fiscally sound, lawmakers from both parties said. Despite several new tax cuts and tax credits, the state is set up to potentially end the 2022-23 fiscal year with a surplus, said House Speaker Bryan Cutler on Thursday after unveiling the spending plan.

Leaders entered budget negotiations with $2.2 billion in remaining federal stimulus funds, as well as more than $8 billion in better-than-expected revenues — and it took them weeks to come to an agreement.

But in the end, they made new investments in several sectors where advocates had been begging for state intervention.

Among them is a new local law enforcement support program that contains $135 million in one-time funds. Pittsburgh and Allegheny County are eligible to receive up to $20 million of money, according to budget documents. And a $50 million program will be available for local law enforcement to investigate and prosecute gun violence.

In addition, community violence prevention programs can access a total of $105 million in state grants as part of the 2022-23 budget, $75 million of which is from one-time federal funds. Community activists have come to Harrisburg in recent months to ask lawmakers to increase funding for violence intervention groups to address rising gun violence rates across the state.

Senior care gets a long-needed bump of $35 a day per resident in the daily Medicaid reimbursement rate. Nursing homes and assisted living facilities have been underfunded for years, and nursing home industry advocates predicted some homes would be forced to shutter without an increase in the Medicaid rate. Nursing homes will also get another $250 million injection of federal funds to address staffing issues that have continued throughout the COVID-19 pandemic.

The state will make a one-time, 70% increase in its property tax rebate program for seniors. This allows seniors whose income is below $30,000 to access rebates up to $1,105 for the home they own or rent. The program was used by more than 444,000 residents in 2020, according to an analysis from House Republicans. The average rebate was $480 that year, and the state issued $213.2 million in rebates.

The state is set to spend $3.9 billion on infrastructure projects on roads and bridges this year, House Republicans said.

The budget also has a new focus on mental health care. A total of $100 million worth of one-time funds was allocated to create a new initiative and commission to better offer psychiatric resources at the primary-care physician level.

And a new $100 million round of school safety and security funds — first given in 2018 after the Marjorie Stoneman Douglass High School shootings in Parkland, Fla. — is available. An additional $100 million was allocated for mental health resources in schools, which will be allocated by the Pennsylvania Commission on Crime and Delinquency and use the same funding formula as the safety and security grant program.

Most exciting in the business community is a state corporate net income tax cut. The CNIT was reduced from its current 9.99% to 8.99%, and will continue to be slashed through 2031, when it reaches 4.99% — a move that Pittsburgh region business leaders said will attract new firms to the state.

Pennsylvania will also increase its Film Tax credit, which encourages producers to film in the state, from $70 million annually to $100 million. It will be locked at this rate through the 2024-25 budget and also sets aside $5 million of that credit for a Pennsylvania-based producer.

ELECTION CHANGES

There were some compromises between Republicans and Democrats on how Pennsylvania should administer its elections, as part of policy changes included in the budget.

First, the Legislature banned counties from accepting outside funds. This was a policy priority for Republicans since a foundation funded by Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberggave grants to some counties around the state during the 2020 election.

Counties will be able to access a $45 million grant program, which will be divvied up by the number of registered voters in a county. This was a crucial deal with Democrats, who worried that banning outside money could leave counties underfunded to conduct their elections. Allegheny County is estimated to be eligible for $4.8 million, according to an analysis by Spotlight PA.

Every county in the state would be eligible for the grants. For example, Beaver County is eligible for up to $579,152, and Westmoreland County is eligible for up to $1.28 million.

But legislative leaders and Mr. Wolf were unable to reach a deal on fixing one big problem that counties have been seeking since 2019: pre-canvassing. County election officials want authorization to allow them to open mail ballots and prepare them for counting before Election Day. Currently, counties cannot touch mail ballots until 7 a.m. on Election Day.

Republicans have said over the last several months that they did not want to touch the election code or any issues in relation to mail voting while litigation is pending over the constitutionality of the state’s vote-by-mail law. This means voters can expect long delays before the counting of mail ballots is completed in the November election.

WHAT DIDN’T MAKE IT

Since February, Mr. Wolf has been traveling the state, touting his proposal for how the remaining $2.2 billion in federal stimulus money from the 2021 American Rescue Plan Act should be spent.

Perhaps the most popular initiative of that proposal was the Pennsylvania Opportunity Program, which would have used $500 million of the remaining federal stimulus dollars to give $2,000 checks directly to families whose annual household income is $80,000 or less. Mr. Wolf said the program was urgently needed as families struggle to make ends meet due to record-high inflation. But Republicans didn’t agree, and the idea was killed.

In his budget address in February, Mr. Wolf also proposed a 5% funding increase for Pennsylvania’s four state-related universities, including the University of Pittsburgh, that hadn’t gotten a funding bump in several years.

This was quickly removed from the table, as lawmakers struggled to reach an agreement to fund all four universities. Pitt was singled out for conducting fetal tissue research. House Republicans wanted to withhold the money if they didn’t stop it.

After days of negotiations, the GOP-controlled House walked back that threat and funded all four schools — Pitt, Penn State, Temple and Lincoln — and appropriated $580 million in total to them. The funding is used to provide in-state students a tuition discount.