Pennsylvania
Costs for Pa. prisons soar despite facility closures
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HARRISBURG — The Pennsylvania Department of Corrections wants more than $300 million in next year’s budget despite a declining population of incarcerated people and the recent closure of two facilities, sparking tough questions from lawmakers.
Democratic Gov. Josh Shapiro’s budget proposal to the state legislature included more than $200 million in additional funding for the department, which would bring the agency’s full request to roughly $3.3 billion. The department is also asking the legislature to approve an additional $100 million in supplemental funds to cover spending beyond last year’s projections.
Officials contend the increase is needed to address both additional federal requirements and dwindling federal funds; obligations to employee union contracts; and overtime driven by staffing vacancies.
But lawmakers questioned how such a substantial increase was needed after the prison system promised savings following the closure of two facilities in 2017 and 2020. State Sen. Lisa Baker (R., Luzerne) noted the request was twice what taxpayers were supposed to save.
“What happened with the cost savings that we expected from those closures?” Baker asked during a February appropriations meeting. “As we look at the cost to carry forward, it doesn’t seem like saving. Taxpayers are going to ask how did we propose $120 million in closures and we’re looking at a double increase currently.”
The simple answer? It costs more to do the same thing.
The corrections department oversees nearly 38,000 incarcerated individuals across 24 prisons and employs more than 17,000 people in both the prison and parole systems. Its budget includes the cost of running the prisons, which is its largest expense, and operating the state’s parole and pardons boards, the Office of Victim Advocate, and the parole system.
About 85% of the corrections budget increase is due to cost-to-carry increases, Harry told legislators at the hearing, or the cost to continue the same level of services the department currently provides.
State prisons are the biggest cost driver, both in overspending last year and additional spending next year. The agency’s proposed budget includes a $169 million increase for the prisons alone, funds that will go toward growing expenses like utilities, food and facility maintenance, and contract-mandated pay increases for the unionized staff and security officers.
The agency also wants the legislature to approve $53 million to cover similar contract-mandated increases during the prior fiscal year.
Medically assisted treatment
The department also saw significant increases in the cost of providing medication-assisted treatment, or MAT, to people who are incarcerated and suffering from opioid use disorder.
MAT uses a combination of counseling, behavioral therapy, and pharmaceutical drugs to help people recover from opioid addiction. In April 2022, the U.S. Department of Justice ruled that opioid use disorder qualifies as a disability under federal law, which required the state prison system to grow its decade-old MAT program to provide proper accommodation.
Despite the mandate, available federal grants don’t cover the full cost of Pennsylvania’s expanded program, which went $10.5 million over budget. Medication and treatment will cost $30 million in the next fiscal year.
In Pennsylvania state prisons, there about 1,800 people receive this type of treatment, Harry said, but the department expects that number to grow as some county jails begin to provide their own therapies to people who are incarcerated before trial.
Staffing issues
Years after the height of the coronavirus pandemic, staff vacancies still troublePennsylvania’s prisons, and caused overtime costs to exceed last year’s projections by $30 million.
Across the prisons, about 8% of positions were unfilled as of April, including 779 corrections officer vacancies.
“Last year, in 2023, the number I see is that there were 40 employees in your department that had received over $100,000 in overtime pay,” said state Sen. Greg Rothman (R., Perry). “Is that acceptable?”
Harry told legislators the department is focused on recruiting and retaining employees to reduce the number of overtime shifts needed to properly staff the prisons. The department has expanded its hiring beyond state borders and to people as young as 18 years old, though only 16 corrections officers under the age of 21 have been hired so far.
At the same time, the population is smaller than it was before the pandemic, which saw numbers dwindle from more than 45,000 people in 2020 to about 36,000 people in 2022.
The population has slowly increased over the past two years, and the agency expects it to plateau around 40,000 people.
But the department does not necessarily adjust staffing levels in lockstep with fluctuations in the incarcerated population because staffing needs vary by institution and account for the physical layout of the prison, the programs offered, and more, said department spokesperson Maria Bivens.
“In addition, the DOC conducts regular staffing surveys at its facilities to ensure effective allocation of personnel,” she said.
Unplanned absences still drive corrections officers to volunteer for additional shifts even as the department has lowered its mandatory overtime rate. Corrections officers are also required to staff hospital posts when an incarcerated person is being treated at a medical facility outside the prison, Bivens said.
“And while the prison population is down from the highs of several years ago, the remaining population is older, and requires more medical care, necessitating additional staff,” she said.
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Pennsylvania
Pennsylvania state police trooper pleads guilty to using work computer to create AI-generated pornography
A Pennsylvania State Police corporal has pleaded guilty to creating AI-generated pornography, possessing child sexual abuse material and secretly filming women, including coworkers and a Montgomery County judge, according to the Pennsylvania Attorney General’s Office.
Thirty-nine-year-old Stephen Kamnik pleaded guilty in Montgomery County Court Wednesday to a total of 15 charges for years of abusing law enforcement databases, state-owned devices and unauthorized material for personal sexual gratification.
Kamnik, who is currently suspended without pay, used secured law enforcement and commonwealth computer systems to create AI-generated pornographic images of numerous women, according to the attorney general’s office. Prosecutors said Kamnik created some of the explicit material at a Montgomery County barracks.
The investigation, which was conducted by state police, found that Kamnik secretly filmed and photographed numerous women while on duty. Authorities said he repeatedly entered the women’s locker room at the state police barracks to take pictures of female officers.
Prosecutors said Kamnik also used the state’s Justice Network, known as JNET, to obtain hundreds of photographs of women, violating database policies.
Investigators also found an unlawfully recorded video of a Montgomery County magisterial district judge during a court proceeding that prosecutors said Kamnik edited for lewd purposes.
Authorities also found a stolen .22-caliber gun during a search of Kamnik’s vehicle in January 2025.
Kamnik pleaded guilty to four felony counts of unlawful use of a computer, sexual abuse of children, misdemeanor counts of invasion of privacy, tampering with evidence and other related offenses.
A Montgomery County judge is scheduled to sentence him July 8.
“These crimes stain the great work being done by law enforcement every day in communities across the Commonwealth,” Attorney General Dave Sunday said in a statement.
A lawsuit filed by a victim who alleges her image was used in AI-generated pornography claims Pennsylvania State Police were aware of prior incidents of Kamnik abusing his position as a state trooper but failed to properly discipline him.
The complaint alleges Kamnik took undergarments belonging to female troopers from a locker room and kept a mannequin at his assigned station where he placed the stolen clothing to photograph it.
It also alleges Kamnik conducted traffic stops involving female motorists while presenting himself as a law enforcement officer and making degrading requests, including asking them to stick out their tongues while he secretly filmed them.
Pennsylvania
When is the deadline to register for the Pennsylvania primary?
(Photo by Megan Varner/Getty Images)
PENNSYLVANIA – The 2026 midterm elections will decide control of the next U.S. Congress and key state leadership, including Pennsylvania’s statewide offices.
Before the general election, each state will hold primaries to determine which candidates appear on the November ballot.
By the numbers:
In Pennsylvania, the May primary will narrow the field of candidates who will compete in the November general election for several important posts, per Ballotpedia.
- U.S. House of Representatives — All 17 districts will hold primaries to choose nominees.
- Pennsylvania Governor — Although both major parties’ current frontrunners are effectively unopposed in their primaries, the contest sets the stage for the November race between incumbent Gov. Josh Shapiro and Republican Stacy Garrity.
- State Legislature — all 203 seats in the Pennsylvania House of Representatives and half of the State Senate seats are up for election, with primaries deciding many general election matchups.
Dig deeper:
Pennsylvania is considered a key battleground state in the 2026 midterms, with several congressional districts expected to be highly competitive and potentially pivotal in determining which party controls the two chambers of Congress.
As of April 2026, the Republican Party controls both chambers of Congress.
On Nov. 3, voters will cast ballots for all 435 U.S. House seats, 35 U.S. Senate seats and numerous state and local positions, according to the Bipartisan Policy Center.
Voters will decide 33 regularly scheduled Senate seats, plus two special elections to fill the seats vacated by J.D. Vance of Ohio and Marco Rubio of Florida, who left Congress to serve as vice president and Secretary of State, respectively.
Voter registration and deadlines
What you can do:
Voters in Pennsylvania who want to take part in the state’s 2026 primary must register by Monday, May 4, according to the Pennsylvania Department of State. This deadline applies to both new registrations and updates to existing voter registrations.
The primary election will be held on Tuesday, May 19. The mail-in ballot request deadline is Tuesday, May 12.
Voters are encouraged to check their registration status and ballot information well before these dates to ensure participation in both the primary and the November general election.
The Source: Information from the Pennsylvania Department of State, Ballotpedia, the Bipartisan Policy Center and previous FOX 5 NY reporting.
Pennsylvania
Multiple Reports Of Fireball Sighting In Eastern PA Skies
Multiple people in the Philadelphia region reported seeing a fireball in the sky Tuesday.
The American Meteor Society listed the event in its meteor sighting database, saying it had received nearly 150 reports from across the region, including in Eastern Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Delaware, and Connecticut about the fireball.
According to the database, reports of the fireball came in from Doylestown, Lansdale, Willow Grove, King of Prussia and more.
Nick Brucato of Whiting shared video of it in The Pine Barrens group on Facebook and with Patch. “Took this video as fast as I could today in Whiting at 2:34 PM. Heard the loud boom minutes later,” he said.
“We were out on our deck and my wife saw it,” a Waretown resident said on the Tri-County Scanner News post. “She said it was bright white ball and then it broke apart into several pieces and then it was gone. Then the sonic boom hit!”
A meteor is the flash of moving light that becomes visible when a meteoroid — a chunk of an asteroid or a comet — hits the Earth’s atmosphere, according to the American Meteor Society.
In mid-March another meteor was the likely cause of a large boom that was felt over parts of Pennsylvania and northeastern Ohio.
The National Weather Service in Pittsburgh said it received reports from numerous people across Western Pennsylvania of the tremendous noise and a fireball in the sky on March 17.
A weather service employee caught the cause of the boom and the weather service posted it. MORE: Meteor Causes Tremendous Boom Over Parts Of PA
With reporting by Karen Wall
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