Shapiro’s proposed Pa. State Police fund saves road dollars but raises accountability concerns
HARRISBURG — In his first budget proposal as governor, Democrat Josh Shapiro aims to resolve a long-standing fiscal conundrum: funding the Pennsylvania State Police without taking money away from bridge and road repairs.
At the moment, $900 million of the agency’s roughly $1.4 billion budget comes from the state’s General Fund, while the rest comes from the state’s Motor License Fund, which receives money from the state’s gas tax and is primarily meant to be used for infrastructure spending.
Shapiro would end those transfers by creating a new restricted bank account for State Police. Unlike the General Fund — the state’s main account, which can use the billions of dollars it receives from sales tax and income tax payments each year for any purpose — this new police account wouldn’t be subject to annual budget negotiations between the governor and legislature.
Instead, by law, a set amount of tax revenue would automatically be allocated to it each year without debate.
“The pledge I’ve made to our state troopers is that that money would be set aside and walled off only for law enforcement, meaning it couldn’t be used for any other purpose,” Shapiro said recently in Erie. “We’ve got to make sure those dollars first go to meeting our law enforcement needs.”
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