Post State Budget Tea Leaf Reading
In Pennsylvania, the governor’s budget address kicks off five months – sometimes 8 to 12 months – of negotiations, hearings, votes, and consternation.
Folks pick apart the governor’s budget address. How many times did he mention farms, main streets, or schools? Where did he focus his applause lines? What was the tone like toward Republicans? How did he credit Democrats?
Advocates can also read the tea leaves in the immediate aftermath of the governor’s budget, too.
The most valuable asset is a governor’s time. How is he spending it immediately after the budget address?
In the governor’s budget address, he took time to talk about his work to lower energy costs.
Affordability has become a political buzzword. Inflation and an untenable cost of living in part cost President Biden his job and Kamala Harris an election, but now it’s flipped on President Trump, who has failed to meet his promises to lower costs for Americans.
In the last year, Democratic campaigns have narrowed in on affordability as a key issue. The concerns include house prices, groceries, and energy.
Gov. Shapiro has been aggressive and smart in his work to lower costs for Pennsylvania families.
He squeezed PJM, a Regional Transmission Organization (RTO) that manages the electric grid and wholesale electricity market across 13 states, including Pennsylvania. Their policies have an outsized impact on energy costs in New Jersey, Maryland, and D.C. Utilities in Pennsylvania cannot generate power, so PJM serves as a market between producers and utilities. They also oversee the energy grid, ensuring sufficient capacity for new energy sources as they come online.
In the last few years, data centers have placed a heavy demand on the grid, while energy supply has not kept pace.
In his budget address, Shapiro pushed PJM to extend PJM’s price cap, provide long-term support for new energy projects, make sure that data centers pay their fair share, and speed up PJM’s stalled interconnection queue.
After the budget address, Gov. Shapiro called the PJM Chairman and Interim CEO, David Mills, pushing him to extend price caps, announcing the action in a press release and appearing on CNBC to discuss his work to hold PJM and utilities accountable and calling PJM’s model to raise prices in order to build capacity “completely broken.”
From a tactical perspective, Gov. Shapiro appeared on television stations in each media market to talk about the budget.
In all of the appearances, he focused on his topline message of affordability, with some region-specific issues popping up. During an interview with a Scranton station, he talked about his proposal to require data center developers adhere to standards, including community transparency, consumer cost protections, community benefits agreements, and environmental protections. In Northeastern Pennsylvania, a deluge of data center proposals has overwhelmed residents and local leaders.
He also connected with content creators and podcasts with national audiences to elevate his proposals and hold our Pennsylvania as a leader.
Because running Pennsylvania is never easy or predictable, Gov. Shapiro also took time to travel to a local fire company to thank them for their work to fight an aggressive fire at a local hospital.
In his budget address, Gov. Shapiro laid out a plan and agenda to aggressively reduce energy costs for Pennsylvania families. If the first week after his address – and how he is spending his time – is any indication, driving down costs and holding PJM’s feet to the fire will be a primary goal of his budget season.
