On today’s episode of The Confluence: We learn about what Governor Tom Wolf is prioritizing in his final budget in office; an obstetric anesthesiologist is leading a clinic to support pregnant people through trauma-informed care and ultimately help with health outcomes; and a look at how some health care professionals are turning to lucrative jobs in travel nursing to deal with the stress and burnout of their jobs throughout the pandemic.
Gov. Tom Wolf’s final budget was proposed Tuesday
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Gov. Tom Wolf yesterday laid out his final proposed budget plan totaling $43.7 billion, which doesn’t include any increases to the state income or sales taxes.
“These are days of opportunity for our commonwealth,” Wolf said, in his address Tuesday to the joint session of the legislature.
“So the opportunity he's talking about there refers to this idea that the state can do more because it can spend more, and it can spend more because it has more money,” says WESA Capitol Bureau Chief Sam Dunklau.
Dunklau says the windfall comes in part from federal pandemic aid to the state, and a strong year in tax revenue, which many trace back to increased spending due to stimulus checks and the Child Tax Credit.
Pennsylvania has about $1.8 billion in surplus money. Many GOP lawmakers, including Senate President Pro Tempore Jake Corman, have said Wolf is overextending the state coffers.
Wolf has earmarked $1.8 billion for K-12 public schools and higher education. He’s including money for the state’s lowest funded districts and special education programs. He has also proposed spending $125 million on higher education.
The $300 million to support 100 underfunded schools comes at a time when the state is being sued by several school districts for underfunding poor schools.
“The central tenet of all of this is that Wolf thinks that the commonwealth will have good tax growth over the next five to seven years,” says Dunklau. “By next June, he is expecting that the state can walk away with a $3 billion surplus, even with the extra spending, and even with, you know, not doing any tax increases or diving into the rainy day fund.”
The state’s Independent Fiscal Office, however, is predicting the state tax revenue will drop by a few billion dollars in the coming year, and could soon face a billion dollar budget deficit.
Negotiations over the budget begin later this month, and should conclude by June.
Allegheny Health Network clinic offers pregnant people trauma-informed care
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Late last year, Allegheny Health Network became one of the first hospital systems to develop a trauma-informed care clinic for pregnant people. According to research, up to 44% of women view their childbirth experience as traumatic. AHN’s trauma-informed care clinic seeks to reduce those experiences and support pregnant people with preexisting traumatic stress.
“We know about one in four women will suffer severe violence from intimate partner violence in their lifetimes, and up to 44%, as we know now, may have suffered from traumatic birth experiences,” says Dr. Tracey Vogel, an obstetric anesthesiologist and trauma-informed care specialist. “So trauma is everywhere, and that's a lot of women coming to our labor and delivery units.”
Vogel is directing the clinic, and says it’s becoming more important to teach and facilitate trauma-informed care because trauma can increase the risk of both health complications and even death for some mothers and babies.
“The clinic serves to help identify specific concerns or fears that these individuals have related to their upcoming delivery experience,” says Vogel. This could include giving an expecting parent a rundown of what happens during labor, or coming up with solutions to reduce their anxiety in a clinical setting.
Vogel has been working with a trauma-informed perspective for close to a decade, and anticipates expanding the clinic soon.
“We're already discussing possibilities of how to connect this with our perinatal hospice program, so that we have a pathway for women who've experienced pregnancy loss and now are pregnant subsequent to that,” says Vogel.
Patients to the clinic are referred from their obstetricians, mental health practitioners, and also self-referred.
Many registered nurses are turning to travel nursing
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Nearly two years into the COVID-19 pandemic, nurses are facing an unprecedented level of stress and burnout across the Commonwealth. Hospitals are dealing with a shortage of registered nurses, leaving many to rely on expensive staffing agencies.
WITF’s Brett Sholtis report, some are becoming travel nurses, with one saying it's a way to make the best of a bad situation.
The Confluence, where the news comes together, is 90.5 WESA’s daily news program. Tune in Monday to Thursday at 9 a.m. and 7:30 p.m. to hear newsmakers and innovators take an in-depth look at stories important to the Pittsburgh region. Find more episodes of The Confluence here or wherever you get your podcasts.
