YEAR IN POLITICS IN PA. Schools were in middle of battle

It was a year of testing and change.
HARRISBURG (AP) -- The Democrats reclaimed the governorship and dominated the statewide judicial elections in 2003.
In the Legislature, a newly fortified Republican majority blocked Gov. Ed Rendell's progressive agenda -- and he, in turn, withheld billions of state subsidy dollars for public schools -- in a protracted partisan stalemate that dragged on through most of the year.
And across the state in both parties, aspiring politicians began lining up this year for prospective statewide campaigns for U.S. Senate and the three state row offices in 2004.
For Pennsylvania's political power structure, 2003 was a year of testing and change.
Incomplete budget
Nowhere was that more evident than at the Capitol, where Pennsylvania's was the only incomplete state budget in the nation for more than two months -- until lawmakers and Rendell agreed on the final piece in late December, nearly halfway through the fiscal year.
In his $3 billion Plan for a New Pennsylvania, the state's first Democratic governor in eight years called for a 30 percent reduction in property taxes, a 34 percent income-tax increase, more than $550 million for learning initiatives in public schools and the legalization of slot machines at racetracks. GOP lawmakers, particularly in the Senate, reacted coolly to the plan and questioned the need for such a large tax increase.
In a duel of political upmanship in March, Rendell stripped the entire $4 billion appropriation for school subsidies from the $21 billion budget that maintained most state services for the fiscal year that started in July. He vowed to withhold the money until lawmakers approved at least some of his initiatives.
With some districts threatening to close for lack of cash, Rendell and legislative leaders struck a $1 billion deal that would provide some of what the governor wanted, including $258 million in new education spending and a nearly 10 percent income-tax increase.
Agreement on the property-tax cuts and slots, which would provide the revenue for them, continued to evade policy-makers, although Rendell vowed to make it a priority in early 2004.
"By the end of January, we'll have a $1 billion tax decrease," he insisted Tuesday after signing legislation to raise taxes and increase spending on education.
Union contracts
The governor had more success on other issues. In spite of lingering resentment from some corners of organized labor over contract concessions he forced on Philadelphia city workers as mayor in the 1990s, he settled four-year pacts with unions representing tens of thousands of state employees. The agreements required employees to pick up part of the cost of their health insurance but guaranteed them pay raises totaling more than 13 percent.
He gave his administration an "A-plus" for saving costs on the government's car fleet and cellular telephone bills and enhancing revenues by instituting midday Lottery drawings, Sunday liquor sales and discount liquor stores in border regions.
Medications for seniors
The governor also resuscitated a bill to expand the state's prescription-drug program -- the Pharmaceutical Assistance Contract for the Elderly, or PACE -- to provide low-cost medications to an estimated 100,000 additional senior citizens starting Jan. 1.
The PACE expansion was approved unanimously, one of several far-reaching bills that sailed through the General Assembly with bipartisan support. Others allowed motorcyclists to ride without helmets and imposed tough new standards and penalties for drunken drivers.
If Rendell's biggest first-year accomplishment was winning limited approval for some of his campaign promises, Republicans took credit for reining in the ebullient executive when it came to new taxes.
"We did our job well, and our job was to make sure that we kept any tax increases to a minimum," said Senate Majority Leader David J. Brightbill, R-Lebanon. "At the same time we've got to ultimately compromise to make sure that our government continues to operate."
"That's the compromise that people voted for when they voted for a Democratic governor and a Republican Legislature," said state Republican Party Chairman Alan Novak.
At the polls, after losing all seven statewide judicial races in 2001 and losing four more seats in the state House of Representatives in 2002, the Democratic Party finally had its turn in the limelight in 2003.
Democrats won three of four open seats on the appellate courts -- one on the Supreme Court and two on the Superior Court -- and the last Superior Court race was still too close to call as the new year approached. Democratic Mayor John Street was re-elected in Philadelphia, and Democrat Dan Onorato unseated GOP incumbent Jim Roddey as Allegheny County chief executive.
Analyst's assessment
Overall, the year provided a mixed picture for the Democrats, but it was better than what they had for eight years, said G. Terry Madonna, a pollster and political-science professor at Millersville University.
"We had a tremendous year," said state Democratic Party Chairman T.J. Rooney, who credited Rendell's leadership.
Rendell, a former general chairman of the Democratic National Committee who stumped for many of the Democratic candidates and contributed about $1 million to their campaigns, "understands how to put together a winning organization and ... the [financial] realities that go with that," Rooney said.
Arlen Specter
U.S. Sen. Arlen Specter's impending bid for a fifth six-year term drew at least two challengers. Conservative U.S. Rep. Pat Toomey plans to take Specter on in the Republican primary, and U.S. Rep. Joe Hoeffel faces no apparent opposition in his bid for the Democratic nomination.
The three state row offices -- attorney general, treasurer and auditor general -- will be open in 2004 for the first time in eight years, and prospective candidates spent this year testing the waters. Nearly a dozen people have said they will or may run, including incumbent Auditor General Robert P. Casey Jr., who lost the Democratic gubernatorial nod last year but is unopposed for the party's nomination for treasurer.
On the national stage, a challenge of Pennsylvania's latest congressional redistricting law made it to the Supreme Court, and court-watchers believe the justices may use the case to set limits on political gerrymandering.
But so far, the campaign for the Democratic presidential nomination has largely passed the state by.
While Pennsylvania is likely to be a crucial swing state in next year's presidential campaign -- a fact underscored by President Bush's frequent visits here -- its relatively late April 27 primary diminished the state's importance as the Democrats jockey for momentum.