Frankel Reaction to State Budget

Representative Dan Frankel of Allegheny County said he voted in favor of the state budget with mixed feelings. He said getting the budget signed in time was extremely important.

He said in past years when the economy has been bad a mixture of things have been done to balance the budget such as cutting appropriations and finding additional revenue.

"There has been no will in the legislature to find additional revenue in spite of the fact that there are sources of revenue out there that are, in my opinion, low-hanging fruit," he said. As examples, he mentioned enacting a gas extraction tax on the Marcellus Shale and taxing smokeless tobacco and cigars.