The PA state budget allocated $31,560,000 to Penn Vet and $1,793,000 to the Penn's Infectious Disease Center after funds were withheld over antisemitism concerns this winter.
Credit: Kylie CooperPennsylvania’s newly passed 2024-25 budget allocated funds to Penn’s School of Veterinary Medicine and Penn Medicine’s Division of Infectious Diseases after the Pennsylvania House of Representatives withheld 2023-24 fiscal year funding over concerns about antisemitism on Penn's campus.
The budget, which was passed by lawmakers last Thursday, allocated all funding that was proposed in February by Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro to the two Penn centers. Penn Vet will receive $31,560,000, while the Division of Infectious Diseases will receive $1,793,000.
The budget’s passage was delayed two weeks into the fiscal year and totals $47.6 billion, a 6% overall increase in the budget in comparison to the previous year’s allocation. With education as a focal point, the largest parts of the approved budget go towards Pennsylvania public schools and other human services throughout the state.
The delay in the legislation's approval was a result of internal disagreements relating to public education funding as well as the methods of poverty measures connected to educational aid. However, after two weeks of negotiations and discussions, the bill passed the State House by a 122-80 vote and in the Pennsylvania State Senate by a 44-5 vote, and was subsequently signed by Shapiro.
Funding for Penn Vet and Penn Medicine’s Division of Infectious Diseases was previously withheld in December 2023, when antisemitism concerns spread throughout campus and the Penn community. The withholding marked the first time Penn Vet had not received state funding since 1889. The State House voted to suppress upwards of $31 million that was intended for Penn Vet and $1.8 million routed to the Division of Infectious Diseases.
As the only government-funded veterinary school in the state, Penn Vet has received funding from the state since 1889, marking the withholding of money a historic change in Pennsylvania’s proposed budget.
Several months later, when the budget proposal was announced in early February, Shapiro designated a combined total of $33 million for both organizations, as was approved in the 2022-23 fiscal year’s budget.
“We appreciate Governor Shapiro acknowledging Penn Vet’s importance to Pennsylvania’s agriculture industry in his budget proposal,” Penn Vet Chief Communications Officer Martin Hackett said in response to the designation.
However, concerns among legislators persisted until recently, as indicated by Pennsylvania State Senate Majority Leader Joe Pittman.
“There’s no doubt that the veterinarian piece of UPenn is productive, helpful, and important,” Pittman said. “But the bigger question of how UPenn has operated over these last several months still looms large in the mindset of many lawmakers in this building.”
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