Thursday morning, the Tyrone Area Chamber of Commerce welcomed Representative Jerry Stern to its monthly breakfast. Stern spoke with the members about issues that will be addressed in the General Assembly in the fall term.
Following his speech and answering questions from chamber members, Stern sat down and spoke with The Daily Herald concerning issues that are facing residents of Northern Blair County today.
Medical Malpractice
“We passed four different proposals that hopefully would impact and lower the medical malpractice rates in Pennsylvania,” said Stern. “The fourth one is currently in the senate and it would require a constitutional change. That would place a $250,000 cap on pain and suffering. That would have to pass two consecutive sessions of the General Assembly and also go to a voter referendum.”
Education
“The governor has the ability to veto any bill that comes to him from the General Assembly,” said Stern. “For us to just send him a general appropriations bill just for basic education funding and nothing of his programs that he wants, the governor has already indicated that he would veto it. He will not negotiate. He will not agree to anything other than the proposals that he is putting forth.
“On Monday, the House Majority Leader attempted to put together an educational package to put money back into all 501 school districts in Pennsylvania and allow them to use some of that money for programs that they needed it for.
“Many of the school districts have talked about the federal ‘No Child Left Behind’ requirements and mandates that are not being funded by the federal government,” said Stern. “This is another mandate coming down from Washington and once again the dollars that are supposed to follow are sketchy and iffy. The schools are looking for the resources to implement these programs and have the governor wants to institute a whole new spending mandate for Pennsylvania’s schools in one broad stroke and all the school districts would have to comply with. Part of the concerns that the House and Senate have is that the one size fits all approach doesn’t work. We need to make it to where the local school districts can make decisions on the local level.”
“We’re also concerned that this huge mandate of 12 percent increased spending, how are we going to pay for that in the future,” said Stern. “The first year is $600 million in the first year, $400 million in the second year and over $1 billion in the third year. What about year four and beyond. If that money isn’t forthcoming from the state, that is going to go back to the property owners who would end up facing higher property taxes.”
Gambling
“I think the gambling proposal is bad because every dollar you generate, you are looking at spending between three and five dollars in social costs,” said Stern. “Now we are cutting some of the social services that the state has been providing, for example drug and alcohol funding. We have reduced funding for libraries. We have reduced funding for the county mental health-mental retardation unit. Those items were all scaled and cut back by Governor Rendell in his first budget proposal. We think that many of those proposals should be restored to their prior funding levels.”
“The other concern is when you have these mega-corporations who control the gambling interests, you are not talking about Mom and Pop business owners, you are talking about large corporations with no identity that are reaping a profit at the expense of the working people of Pennsylvania.
“This impacts not only the working public, but also the business owners across Pennsylvania. Once you give them a favored status and give them a license to have casinos or whatever, they are going to come in and build facilities, restaurants and all the ammenities that you can think of and it will put out the local businesses and how they make their living. They may call it economic development. I see it as canibalism of other businesses.”
Stern and the General Assembly will be taking up these and other issues in the fall session.
