On Nov. 13, the Independent Fiscal Office (IFO) released its five-year economic and budget outlook, evaluating the demographic, economic, revenue and expenditure trends that will impact the commonwealth's fiscal situation over the next five years. That report predicts the state will face a shortfall of $1.85 billion in FY 2015-2016, including $171 million related to the current fiscal year and $1.679 billion related to the coming year, and that this anticipated budgetary shortfall is likely to result in a long-term fiscal imbalance in the state.

According to the IFO, a structural disparity in FY 2015-2016 will be caused by the use in the FY 2014-2015 budget of $572 million in non-recurring revenues, $619 million in one-time savings and $332 million in funding shifts. Expenditure growth in the short term will be driven by mandated employer pension contributions, although the report explains that trend should begin to moderate following FY 2016-2017.

Further, the IFO found that Pennsylvania is seeing a slow erosion of its tax base and expenditure growth, predicting the commonwealth's net revenue will increase at an average rate of just 2.7 percent per year. Further, revenues will likely be outpaced by expenditures, which are projected to grow at an average of 4.1 percent annually.  

The state Supreme Court has issued a unanimous opinion in Pennsylvania Gaming Control Board v Office of Open Records, ruling that individuals who file written requests under the state's Right to Know Law must address them to the open records officers of the agencies they are targeting if they wish the requests to be enforceable under the terms of the law. The Nov. 10 decision reverses a June 2012 Commonwealth Court decision in which the lower court had determined that public records requests filed under the state's Right to Know Law do not need to cite the law or satisfy other technicalities, as long as they include the requester's name and address and enough information for government agencies to identify the records sought.

The case originated when the Pennsylvania Gaming Control Board chose to ignore a request for records because it was not submitted on an official form and did not say it was filed under the Right to Know Law. On appeal, the state's Open Records Office said that an agency cannot ignore requests for simple failure to comply with their procedures. The Commonwealth Court, on affirmation, concluded that agencies should presume written requests for records are Right to Know requests, even if not submitted on a designated form or to the proper agency officer. However, the Supreme Court sided with the Gaming Control Board, arguing that the Right to Know Law specifies that written information requests must be made to open records officers "in some meaningful way" and that this procedure must be followed to trigger the timeframes for response from the agencies.

On Nov. 13, CCAP submitted comments to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and Army Corps of Engineers expressing counties' concerns with the proposed definition of "Waters of the U.S" (WOTUS) and asking that the proposal be withdrawn and modified after careful consideration of all comments submitted.

CCAP's comments highlight the vagueness of the definition, and argue that Pennsylvania already has a strong regulatory framework in place to protect all waters of the commonwealth, so an expansion of federal jurisdiction would only add a layer of permitting and paperwork without any benefit to the state's water quality. In addition, an expansion of the "Waters of the U.S." definition would remove decisions to the federal level, whose staff are not on the ground dealing with these issues every day in the same way that counties are. The National Association of Counties (NACo) also submitted comments on the proposal, both on its own and jointly with six other agencies representing local governments and agencies. More than 12,000 unique public comments were received prior to the Nov. 14 deadline.