by Casey Seiler

ALBANY — As the Legislature prepares to return to Albany, Gov. David Paterson issued some of his toughest words yet for lawmakers and another group he’s been at odds with for months: state worker unions.

“I think the planning for layoffs is going to have to begin immediately,” Paterson told reporters Monday morning after throwing out the first pitch at a tee-ball championship in Lincoln Park.

Elaborating on comments made last week by state Budget Director Robert Megna, Paterson said the move was necessary because of unions’ ongoing resistance to granting concessions that would trim $250 million from the work force budget.

Last week, Megna said the number of layoffs and the timetable for implementing them will depend on the results of an early retirement option designed to cull the public employee rolls.

“I don’t know what the date would be that we would have to have layoffs,” Paterson said, “but since the work force would not negotiate a lag period, which would have been a shared sacrifice for everybody, or a furlough, which would have been a process where everyone gave a little so everyone could stay working, some unfortunate people who don’t deserve it are going to get laid off.

“And it burns me to have to say it, because I don’t think it’s fair to them. But it’s the only way we’re going to be able to balance our budget,” Paterson said.

The furlough plan, which Paterson forced past the Legislature in an emergency budget extender, was struck down by a federal judge two months ago.

Paterson said last year’s “memo of understanding,” or MOU, between his administration and the powerful state workers unions PEF and CSEA — guaranteeing no layoffs through 2010 in exchange for labor support of the now-instituted Tier V pension package — was “a plan” that was going to have to be adjusted along with the state’s fiscal outlook.

“I sat down and worked out an agreement with the unions a year ago, but that presumed that we would get greater stimulus money from Medicaid. We lost what may be a billion dollars from that source, and everybody is going to have to make a sacrifice,” he said.

“Everybody finds a way that someone else should make the sacrifice, and that they shouldn’t,” he said. “And I don’t think that’s a very good culture, or the spirit of New York. It’s not the way New Yorkers addressed this problem 80 years ago.”

In a response statement, CSEA President Danny Donohue insisted that the MOU was a binding agreement. Also, “talk of layoffs under these circumstances is counterproductive, impractical and bad for New Yorkers all around,” he said. “They may also constitute bad-faith bargaining.”

PEF President Kenneth Brynien said it was “unconscionable for the governor to continue scapegoating state employees and their families for the fiscal crisis, or use them as pawns in his negotiations with the Legislature.”

Brynien said the governor would be better off ordering agency heads to make the retirement incentive available to as many workers as possible. When a similar incentive was offered last year, it fell short of its target number — in part because agencies were reluctant to give up the positions that would be eliminated after the worker’s retirement.

Paterson spokeswoman Jessica Bassett said that the Budget Division was currently receiving final plans for the incentive program — including the specific titles of those slated to get it — from the individual agencies.

She said the administration was encouraging the agencies to be “aggressive.”

All told, the state hopes to lose between 3,000 and 6,000 workers this year through the incentive, although retirements from the judiciary and SUNY won’t be complete until the end of 2010, Bassett said.

State workers can take a degree of comfort from the fact that Paterson had equally hard words for lawmakers.

“The type of budget the Legislature is proposing will put us back in the hole,” said the governor, whose agenda for Wednesday’s extraordinary session includes many of his original revenue proposals — including a tax on sugary beverages and the introduction of wine sales in grocery stores — that lawmakers have shown little appetite for. Also on Paterson’s agenda: a contingency plan for the possible loss of Medicaid funds, and a plan to revise tuition-setting power for some SUNY and CUNY campuses.

While the governor can compel lawmakers to come to Albany for the extraordinary session, they can gavel in and out without taking up any of his proposals. Paterson was asked if he would look at the Legislature’s refusal to even accept his revenue bills as a slap in the face.

“I think it’s already a slap in the face — but it’s not personal,” he said. “It’s not my face they’re slapping. It’s the faces of the people of the state of New York.”

The current plan is to hold a session at 6 p.m. Wednesday, with a Thursday session to follow if sufficient progress isn’t made. Paterson said he wanted to see the results of those sessions before deciding whether or not to call both houses back for additional ones.

Paterson met Monday afternoon in New York City with Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver and Senate Democratic Conference Leader John Sampson. Emerging from that meeting, the governor said he wouldn’t comment on the Legislature’s alternative proposals until his staff analyzes them.