And the budget stalemate continues.

With policy chief John Hanger's exit, Wolf's 'team of rivals' is no more

http://blog.pennlive.com/capitol-notebook/2016/02/with_policy_chief_john_hangers.html

In a building full of sharp elbows, John Hanger possessed some of the sharpest. But you wouldn't know it to look at him.Wonkish to a fault, the Wolf administration's Policy Czar could come off as a tad rumpled and academic in person. But if you spent more than a couple of minutes in conversation with Hanger, it wouldn't take long for the gloves to come off.

*And they'd come off hard - especially when it came to Republicans, whom he accused of "[misrepresenting]" the administration's priorities during budget talks last fall.In a Dec. 28 memo, Hanger dismissed a GOP-approved stopgap plan intended to get cash to schools and nonprofits as part of a trend of"fiscally irresponsible" spending documents that have "led to massive structural deficits and multiple credit downgrades."

The feeling was mutual. Republicans despised Hanger and complained that his corrosive rhetoric was one of the biggest obstacles to getting a deal on Pennsylvania's long-delayed state budget.They blamed him for any number of offenses -- up to and including  the ouster of a state senator's husband, months shy of retirement, from his post at the state Department of Community and Economic Development. 

And now he's gone.In a building full of sharp elbows, John Hanger possessed some of the sharpest. On Friday, the administration said Hanger was stepping down so he could join his wife and daughter in Massachusetts. Hanger's wife, Luanne E. Thorndyke, is the vice-provost for faculty affairs at the University of Massachusetts Medical School.In a statement, Hanger said "commuting regularly to and from Massachusetts and doing my demanding job has become impossible. 

At this point, it is important to place first my wife of 36 years and my remarkable daughter who have supported me in my work." Hanger's departure, which comes more than eight months after the resignation of ex-Chief of Staff Katie McGinty, spells the official end of Wolf's "Team of Rivals" era.Both Hanger and McGinty challenged Wolf for the Democratic gubernatorial nomination in 2014. And both were viewed as far more ideological than Wolf, who had run as an outsider vowing to change the tone in Harrisburg.But for much of Wolf's first year in office that new tone sounded an awful lot like the old one.

McGinty, for instance, was seen as the force behind the controversial firing of Office of Open Records boss Erik Arneson (who was later reinstated after a lengthy court fight).  Hanger was a forceful advocate of a severance tax on natural gas drillers, arguing it was long past due, since the Republican Corbett administrationwas widely seen as "in bed with the Marcellus Shale industry."So with the two gone, it's tempting to ask whether that new tone Wolf pledged to set back in those faraway days of January 2015 might now finally get its day.Republicans were guarded - and not without reason. The same hopes were voiced - and dashed - when veteran Capitol hand Mary Isenhour replaced McGinty as Wolf's chief of staff last year.

Jennifer Kocher, a spokeswoman for Senate Majority Leader Jake Corman, said Senate Republicans are "cautiously optimistic that this is [a sign of] a kinder, gentler Wolf administration."Maybe with Secretary Hanger being gone ... this will be a key toward making progress in [budget] negotiations."Steve Miskin, a spokesman for House Republicans, wasn't nearly so optimistic."He's just one of the vitriolic personalities there," Miskin said. "Only time will tell if it changes the tone and tenor of this administration."Sheridan meanwhile, says it's still up to Republicans to meet Wolf halfway."If they're expecting the governor to stop telling the truth, they're wrong," he said.

"We still have a deficit and we still have underfunded schools. And he's not going to stop talking about that."So the more things change ... right?