Tuesday’s vote by the House State Government Committee to advance legislation that would shrink the size of the Pennsylvania House of Representatives from 203 to 151 should be celebrated.

Not as a half-measure or a move that presages political upheaval, but as a full-blown win for taxpayers in Pennsylvania, period.

We’re not sure what took so long — the legislation, HB 153, has spent the last year sitting in committee waiting for be voted upon — but later is better than never when it comes to this legislation.

The 14-10 vote Tuesday — mostly along party lines, with Republicans voting in favor and Democrats opposed — brings Pennsylvania closer than ever before to finally reducing the size of its bloated and ineffective General Assembly.

Because the reduction requires amending the state constitution, the process is long and arduous: HB 153 must be approved in two consecutive legislative sessions and then sent to voters in a statewide referendum. If voters approve the measure then the state must wait for the next Census, in 2020, to redraw legislative districts and account for the House’s membership shrinking.

What we’re trying to say is: Pennsylvania is staring at a once-in-a-decade opportunity to shrink the size of government. Republicans in control of the General Assembly, many of whom love regularly holding forth on the benefits of small government, cannot afford to mess this up.

We’re disappointed to see some Democrats working against HB 153. On Tuesday the committee’s minority members said they did not support shrinking the House without first reforming the state’s redistricting process. They also tried unsuccessfully to amend the bill — a move that would have restarted the entire process and made it impossible to put the question to voters this year.

Don’t misunderstand: Democrats’ amendment, which would have put reapportionment and redistricting duties in the hands of an 11-member citizen commission, is a worthy reform. Their stated concerns — that shrinking the House’s size without reforming the redistricting process will lead to more political chicanery — are valid.

But the idea that Pennsylvania can afford to wait for perfect conditions, or a perfect package of legislation, to reform its state government is absurd.

Right now taxpayers are pouring millions of dollars each year into a General Assembly that is offensively inept and almost universally unpopular.

Polls conducted last year by Franklin & Marshall College found that nearly half of the state’s registered voters believe Pennsylvania is on the wrong track, and pegged the General Assembly’s approval rating at just 14 percent.

Trimming these seats from the House would save $15 million a year and still leave Pennsylvania with more House members than California, New York and Texas.

HB 153 will not magically solve all of Pennsylvania’s problems. But if that is the metric by which we should evaluate all reform bills, no progress will ever be made.