Is the third time the charm for Gov. Tom Wolf when it comes to state budgets? We’ll likely have to wait until summertime to get a definitive answer to that question, but we already know one thing for sure.

The governor’s address on Tuesday provided a better starting point for budget negotiations than Pennsylvania has had in years. That’s great news, since the state is facing a $3 billion budget deficit and will likely need every bit of time between now and July 1 to chart a reasonable way forward.

Essentially admitting defeat when it comes to getting the Republican-dominated General Assembly to enact broad tax hikes was a great place for Wolf to start. Those notions were always fanciful and unproductive — something the governor seems to have had to learn the hard way over the past two years. But now that the lesson’s been learned, it’s possible that Wolf can help bring together the best budget impulses of liberals and conservatives.

Pennsylvania’s government — both its political and bureaucratic arms — has grown bloated and inefficient. Saving $143 million by trimming state jobs and $100 million by merging the Department of Corrections and Board of Probation and Parole is a good start.

But the state needs to push even harder. Jettisoning its monopoly on liquor sales as well — a move that would both shrink the government’s payroll and bring in millions of dollars — was a disappointing omission from Wolf’s proposal.

Which brings us to Pennsylvania’s General Assembly. If the governor is unable or unwilling to get Pennsylvania out of what should be a private industry, state legislators need to do it for him. They have a role to play here, and it can’t amount to playing the opposition party like they’ve done over the past two budget cycles.

Legislators also need to do something Wolf can’t possibly do: thin their own ranks in the 253-member General Assembly. While they’re at it, they should also do away with the ridiculous $175-per-day “per diem” legislators can claim, no questions asked. The system invites abuse and costs taxpayers tens of thousands of dollars each day. It is the very definition of low-hanging fruit when it comes to overhauling state government.

A proposal that’s going to take buy-in from both sides to move forward is Wolf’s plan to charge a $25-per-resident fee to municipalities that rely upon Pennsylvania State Police for coverage. It’s not a new idea, and it’s sure to make rural lawmakers, whose constituencies often fall into that category, wary at least.

Municipalities on the hook for the fee may not like it. But Wolf’s idea is to use half of the $63 million in new revenue to hire and train more state troopers to protect those same communities.

As Rep. R. Lee James, R-64th, said Tuesday: “Everybody hates taxes, but that’s a good one. That’s a usage tax.”

One glaring hole in Wolf’s address was pension reform, which Sen. Don White, R-41st, is correctly harping on as “the elephant in the room” that wasn’t addressed at all on Tuesday. The issue is now a $60-billion liability that is hamstringing public education — particularly in poorer, rural school districts — and driving taxes up for property owners across the state.

Nobody in Harrisburg seems willing to do anything more than point out the obvious: it needs to be everyone’s issue number-one. But Wolf didn’t even do that much on Tuesday. He just sidestepped the issue entirely.

That didn’t sit well with Sen. White and others, who said they’re not sure any new spending should happen until the state solves this pre-existing problem.

They’ve got a point. But that also seems a convenient excuse for conservatives, who for years have enjoyed historic majorities in the General Assembly and still failed to produce meaningful solutions to the pension crisis .

But we have hope. If Gov. Wolf can reign in his tax-and-spend mantra, the Legislature can live up to its reputation for fiscal conservatism and help him out with meaningful and responsible pension reform.

It takes two to tango. Let the budget dance begin.