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East Penn board urges Pennsylvania to enact 2025–26 budget; officials describe stopgap options if impasse continues
Summary
The East Penn School District passed a resolution urging the Commonwealth to enact the overdue 2025–26 state budget. Administrators briefed the board on contingency measures districts can use if the impasse continues, and IU and regional partners reported growing pressure from missing state payments for early intervention services.
The East Penn School District board on Monday voted to urge the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania to promptly enact the overdue 2025–26 state budget, citing risks to district operations and services if the impasse continues.
"Resolved that the board of school directors of East Penn School District urges the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania to promptly enact the overdue state budget for the 25–26 school year so that public school districts can receive their entitled funding," said the motion introduced at the meeting. The board approved the PSBA-prepared resolution and said the signed exhibit would be sent to Harrisburg.
Why it matters: district and intermediate-unit officials told the board the state budget impasse is already disrupting services in the region. At the CLIU (Carbon-Lehigh Intermediate Unit) report, officials said early intervention services across the IU are underfunded by about $3.5 million this school year because state payments tied to the budget have not been released. "The IU is legally obligated to provide these services, and so they have no choice but to find the funds and keep them going," CLIU director reporting said.
District contingency planning: administrators described the tools districts typically use while a state budget is unsettled, aiming to avoid layoffs where possible. Options include short-term bank loans, tax-anticipation notes, delayed vendor payments, internal reserve usage and, as a last resort, measures such as staff furloughs. "There are a number of levers we could pull…we could look to many other school districts to see which levers they pulled first, because there will be many school districts that will have to do those things before we do," a staff member in business operations told the board.
Board members asked how prolonged impasse (past February) would affect operations. Administrators said the district would evaluate options in sequence, prioritizing loans and cash management, and noted the state sometimes helps with debt payments though that option is not preferable.
Provenance: the motion and approval of the PSBA resolution occurred during the business operations section of the Oct. 27 meeting; CLIU and district staff provided regional fiscal-impact updates during committee reports.
