Wednesday, July 02, 2003

New fiscal year brings tough choices for counties (Pennsylvania)
Pocono Record story - "County officials across Pennsylvania face tough decisions to suspend social service programs and, in many cases, lay off employees with the start of the new state fiscal year. The new state budget for fiscal 2003-04 contains major spending cuts for a host of social service programs run by counties. The programs taking the biggest hit provide drug and alcohol abuse treatment, mental health and mental retardation services, rape crisis services, local mass transit operations, local libraries and other social services under the umbrella of the Human Services Development Program. And as a new fiscal year began Tuesday, legislative leaders said there are no agreements in sight yet on restoring the cuts made in the early-bird budget passed last March. ..." See also the Philadelphia Inquirer story, Pennsylvania budget cuts already running deep.