FIRST QUARTER ON THE NEW YORK STATE BUDGET
Allowing budgets that are this close to the vest to pass is fiscally irresponsible, it is not like they did not see this coming. Voters should think long and hard about voting for any incumbent who voted to approve a budget like this and allow a situation to occur, budgeting is one of the main jobs of a legislator and it requires a little insightful planning.
The Governor has requested a "hard" hiring freeze in the state expected to eliminate 1,000 budgeted positions. The unions are crying foul and digging in against Governor Paterson. This will be enough to scare most state legislators into hiding.
More from the Empire Center's Public Payroll Watch.
"We confront harsh times"
Whenever a New York governor talks about budget deficits--a too frequent occurrence during past 35 years--state workers get the jitters.In a statewide speech Tuesday, Paterson said he is calling the Legislature to Albany to "an emergency economic session" on August 19.
In the interim, my administration will confront the following issues: addressing the size of the state work force; further cuts to agency spending and generating proposals for public and private partnerships for our State assets.The expected General Funds deficit of $6.4 billion is roughly equivalent to the personal services portion of the General Fund. The state spends another $3 billion on employee health and pension benefits, putting annual employee costs at $9.4 billion.
State employee unions already complain Paterson wants to balance the budget on the backs of state workers. He can't--unless he intends to layoff the two-thirds of the workforce. A highly improbable scenario.
1 comment:
You do realize that Bruno and Skelos had more to do with this budget than anyone. Jim Wright always bragged that the Senate's budget was always the one the state settled on. Looks like Bruno's responsible for the sinking ship more than anyone if it was his budgets, according to ol' Jim, that we've been picking the last 10 years.
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