Hey PaLady….if you’re out there, fill us in on this one!!!

By Christina Gostomski and John L. Micek
The Morning Call (Allentown, Pa.)

Barring a breakthrough in the state budget impasse, Pennsylvania government will screech to a halt Monday morning, forcing public campgrounds, driver’s license centers and a host of other services to close. It remains unclear whether casinos will be included in the shutdown, thanks to a last-minute lawsuit.

No agreement was reached late Friday. The Associated Press reported that negotiators said they expected to meet Saturday night.

“I can’t say there was any movement tonight, but we didn’t go backward,” state Sen. Vincent Fumo, D-Philadelphia, said after negotiations Friday night.

Asked whether he thought lawmakers could avert a furlough of state employees, House Minority Leader Sam Smith, R-Jefferson, said that’s up to Gov. Ed Rendell. “It would really depend on how things go.”

Pennsylvanians angry over the potential impact of the impasse on public services called Friday for legislators and Rendell to resolve their stalemate.

“I think they take enough money out of us in taxes that they should have enough left over to keep the state parks open,” said John Carr of Perkasie, after kayaking at Nockamixon State Park in Bucks County.

Campgrounds, swimming pools and bathrooms at state parks and forests are among the services scheduled to shut down Monday.

“Just as we get paid to do our work here, this is what [the lawmakers] get paid for,” state worker Everald McDonald of Elizabethtown, Lancaster County, told The Associated Press. “Somebody’s not doing their job.”

More at the Sun Sentinel