Pennsylvania voters keep watch as legislative session winds down

Associated Press

HARRISBURG, Pa.

Pennsylvania lawmakers hoping to impress voters with the quality of their work product have about five months left in the current two-year session to add to it.

But as a practical matter, time is getting very short.

After the budget passes, most of them will vacate Harrisburg until after Labor Day, and Senate leaders long ago declared they would not convene a lame-duck session after the fall election.

That leaves just a few weeks of voting sessions in September and October for legislators to improve on a list of accomplishments that features passage of table games at casinos and new gambling regulations, the successful tax-amnesty program, a rescue of Philadelphia’s financial crisis and a couple of dozen other — less monumental — laws.

The Legislature has passed 89 bills since January 2009, among them reauthoriza-tion of the Health Care Cost Containment Council, extension of 911 fees on telephone users, imposition of more fire-safe cigarette standards, expansion of unemployment and health benefits and the toughening of animal-cruelty laws.

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