LANCASTER — The blame for the thousands of teachers losing their jobs rests with Pennsylvania school districts, not the deep cuts in state aid in Pennsylvania’s newly enacted budget, Gov. Tom Corbett suggested Tuesday.

Answering reporters’ questions after an address to a statewide police chiefs group, Corbett said he regrets seeing anybody get laid off, but he also asserted that school districts should have budgeted more conservatively.

“We will not be laying off the school district teachers,” Corbett said. “And the school districts have their own financial decisions that they have to make. I would note that many of them took the federal money, (were) told that the federal money would go away, made their budgets in the past based upon that, and now that money is not there. It’s not a reduction that the Legislature or I made to them.”

The state’s $27.2 billion spending plan that Corbett signed June 30 cuts roughly $900 million in state aid for public schools from the more than $7.5 billion that the schools received last year for instruction and operations.

For the just-ended school year, former Gov. Ed Rendell and state lawmakers used $654 million in one-time federal aid for public schools and set aside $387 million in federal aid for the upcoming school year.

However, Corbett, who took office in January, and the Legislature moved the $387 million onto last year’s books, creating a $1 billion cliff. The one-time federal aid was designed to help states weather the recession’s effect on tax collections at a time when Pennsylvania and many other states faced multibillion-dollar budget deficits.

Corbett opposed raising taxes to balance the budget, and instead pursued spending cuts, particularly in education aid.