The Senate Appropriations Committee held the 2025 Department of Human Services (DHS) Budget Hearing at the Capitol in Harrisburg on Wednesday, March 5, 2025. DHS was represented by Secretary Dr. Valerie Arkoosh and Gloria Gilligan, Director of Fiscal Management, Office of the Budget. Other DHS leadership was also present.

The Senate Appropriations Committee was equipped with questions surrounding the proposed $21B DHS budget that focused on intersects with operating critical services for vulnerable Pennsylvanians across the human services landscape. RCPA submitted questions to the House Appropriations Committee’s legislators that voiced the concerns of the membership across all policy areas.

The hearing today covered several of those questions, including:

• The projected $2.5B dollar increase in the capitation and intersects with Medicaid unwinding in PA;
• Impacts of potential federal Medicaid cuts on state Medicaid funding;
• Addressing IDD waitlists and funding;
• The ongoing funding of SNAP benefits and how the state is addressing fraud, waste, and abuse;
• Efforts to stabilize the human services workforce infrastructure with hiring and retention funding;
• Maternal Health Care funding;
• The viability of funding for the PA Medicaid 1115 Waiver;
• Childcare and early education funding, including $10M in early intervention workforce monies;
• Concerns about the fiscal and operational risks of covering GLP-1 medications; and
• The absence of a unified plan for the allocation and implementation of the $100M in school-based mental health funding.

View the 2025/26 Department of Human Service Blue Book for in-depth budget information. Members can watch the full hearings and read the transcripts below:

• Morning Budget Hearing
  • Transcript
• Afternoon Budget Hearing
  • Transcript

Contact your RCPA Policy Director with any questions.