Gov. Tom Corbett said he hopes to maintain current funding levels next year for public schools and the four state-related universities, but warned that could change if he does not get the reforms he supports to public sector pension plans.

Corbett described his approach Wednesday in an interview with the editorial board of The Philadelphia Inquirer.

The first-term Republican did not lay out all the details of his pension proposal, saying they would be part of his Feb. 5 budget address. But he did say his 2013–14 budget proposal would be “based on some assumptions,” and if structural pension changes do not pass, then “there’s going to have to be some adjustments to the budget.”

Corbett told the paper he and his budget secretary were considering revisions to the pension formulas that could significantly alter the retirement benefits of current state workers and school employees. Corbett said he did not envision reductions in retirees’ benefits, or to the pension benefits active employees have already accrued.

He said he was sticking to the no-tax pledge he made during the 2010 gubernatorial campaign, but declined to say whether he would maintain that in seeking a second term next year.

A major transportation package that had been scheduled to be announced this week will instead be part of the budget address, Corbett said.

A question about his hopes to privatize the state-owned Liquor Control Board was answered by Corbett asking if the journalists knew anyone who was against the idea. “We are going to address the LCB,” he said, smiling. — (AP)

LAS VEGAS — A spokeswoman for Michael Jackson's father says the musical family's patriarch has suffered a mild stroke.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Lawrence Guyot, a civil rights leader who survived jailhouse beatings in the Deep South in the 1960s and went on to encourage generations to get involved, has died. He was 73.

Guyot had a history of heart problems and suffered from diabetes, and died at home in Mount Rainier, Maryland, his daughter Julie Guyot-Diangone said late Saturday. She said he died sometime Thursday night; other media reported he passed away Friday.

A Mississippi native, Guyot worked for the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee and served as director of the 1964 Freedom Summer Project, which brought thousands of young people to the state to register Blacks to vote despite a history of violence and intimidation by authorities. He also chaired the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party, which sought to have Blacks included among the state's delegates to the 1964 Democratic National Convention. The bid was rejected, but another civil rights activist, Fannie Lou Hamer, addressed the convention during a nationally televised appearance.

Guyot was severely beaten several times, including at the notorious Mississippi State Penitentiary known as Parchman Farm. He continued to speak on voting rights until his death, including encouraging people to cast ballots for President Barack Obama.

"He was a civil rights field worker right up to the end," Guyot-Diangone said.

Guyot participated in the 40th anniversary of the Freedom Summer Project to make sure a new generation could learn about the civil rights movement.

"There is nothing like having risked your life with people over something immensely important to you," he told The Clarion-Ledger in 2004. "As Churchill said, there's nothing more exhilarating than to have been shot at — and missed."

His daughter said she recently saw him on a bus encouraging people to register to vote and asking about their political views. She said he was an early backer of gay marriage, noting that when he married a white woman, interracial marriage was illegal in some states. He met his wife Monica while they both worked for racial equality.

"He followed justice," his daughter said. "He followed what was consistent with his values, not what was fashionable. He just pushed people along with him."

Susan Glisson, executive director of the William Winter Institute for Racial Reconciliation at the University of Mississippi, called Guyot "a towering figure, a real warrior for freedom and justice."

"He loved to mentor young people. That's how I met him," she said.

When she attended Ole Miss, students reached out to civil rights activists and Guyot responded.

"He was very opinionated," she said. "But always — he always backed up his opinions with detailed facts. He always pushed you to think more deeply and to be more strategic."

Glisson said Guyot's efforts helped lay the groundwork for the Voting Rights Act of 1965.

"Mississippi has more Black elected officials than any other state in the country, and that's a direct tribute to his work," she said.

Guyot was born in Pass Christian, Mississippi, on July 17, 1939. He became active in civil rights while attending Tougaloo College in Mississippi, and graduated in 1963. Guyot received a law degree in 1971 from Rutgers University, and then moved to Washington, where he worked to elect fellow Mississippian and civil rights activist Marion Barry as mayor in 1978.

Guyot worked for the District of Columbia government in various capacities and as a neighborhood advisory commissioner.

D.C. Delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton told The Post in 2007 that she first met Guyot within days of his beating at a jail in Winona, Mississippi. "Because of Larry Guyot, I understood what it meant to live with terror and to walk straight into it," she told the newspaper. On Friday, she called Guyot "an unsung hero" of the civil rights movement.

"Very few Mississippians were willing to risk their lives at that time," she said. "But Guyot did."

In recent months, his daughter said he was concerned about what he said were Republican efforts to limit access to the polls.

Funeral services are pending. — (AP)