Union Membership Lowest in 15 Years

By Patrick McGeehan

New York and New Jersey may have stopped shedding jobs in 2010, but their labor unions have not, a report released Thursday by the federal Department of Labor shows.

The two states are longtime strongholds of organized labor, but union membership in each fell to its lowest level in at least 15 years in 2010, the report (see also below) shows. All told, the number of union members in the two states declined by almost 145,000, while the total number of jobs in the two states was nearly flat at about 11.8 million, the report shows.

In New York, the share of all workers who are members of unions fell to 24.2 percent, from 25.2 percent in 2009, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, which has compiled comparable data since 1995. In New Jersey, the drop was more pronounced: union membership fell to 17.1 percent, from 19.3 percent in 2009.

That decline translated to a loss of almost 85,000 union jobs in New Jersey, where state and local governments have been laying off workers. New York lost about 60,000 union jobs last year, the bureau reported.

Workers were still much more likely to be members of unions in the two states than in most others. The national rate of union membership in 2010 was 11.9 percent.

Despite the drop, New York remains the most highly unionized state in the nation. New Jersey is ranked sixth, also behind Alaska, Hawaii, Washington and California. California, where union membership rose to 17.5 percent from 17.2 percent in 2009, moved above New Jersey, Connecticut, Illinois, Michigan and Rhode Island last year.

Bloomberg Seeks a Sweeping Overhaul of City’s Pensions

By David. W. Chen

Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg proposed sweeping changes on Wednesday to New York’s costly pension system, seeking to save billions of dollars by fundamentally altering long-established rules that have awarded generous retirement benefits to municipal workers and have deepened the city’s financial hole.

In trying to control soaring pension costs, Mr. Bloomberg is taking aim at retirement rules considered sacrosanct by the city’s powerful municipal unions and their political allies.

The mayor wants to require most new municipal workers to work at least 10 years, or double the current amount, to qualify for a pension, and bar them from receiving pension checks until age 65. Now most nonuniformed workers, including teachers, can get pension checks at age 57, and some police officers and firefighters can receive full pension checks after working 20 years, no matter their age.

New employees would also need to contribute more of their own money to their retirement accounts, according to the plan.

And Mr. Bloomberg would forbid all new employees to benefit from a time-honored practice: adding hundreds of hours of overtime at the end of their careers to balloon their final year’s pay and their pensions.

The mayor did not spare current retirees, vowing to eliminate a $12,000 annual stipend that retired police officers and firefighters get on top of their regular pension benefits.

“This reflects the dire fiscal circumstances the city faces, the devastating impact of increasing pension costs and the desperate need for aggressive reforms,” said Marc La Vorgna, a mayoral spokesman.

The mayor’s pension proposal — coming one day after a shrunken state budget from the new governor, Andrew M. Cuomo, with similar tough talk — represents a clear bid to capitalize on growing concerns about pension costs and rising anti-union sentiments, even among traditional labor allies.

Public pensions are being tightened in other states across the country where government employees, as in New York, receive far more generous retirement benefits than most private employees; many companies are eliminating pensions altogether.

But Mr. Bloomberg’s proposal also represents a departure from his own past practices. His administration has been responsible for a significant portion of the growth in city pension costs, offering generous pension sweeteners during contract negotiations and repeatedly missing opportunities to rein in spending.

Indeed, pension costs are now projected to eat up one of every eight city dollars next year, in contrast to 1 in 28 when he took office in 2002.

Mr. Bloomberg’s package could help the city save at least $200 million a year immediately, and billions of dollars more in the future. But his proposal faces a potentially major obstacle because any changes in the city’s pension system must be approved by the Legislature and the governor.

The mayor has potential allies in Mr. Cuomo and the new Senate majority leader, Dean G. Skelos, a Republican. But Sheldon Silver, the Assembly speaker, will most likely be the wild card.

A spokeswoman for Mr. Silver did not respond to an e-mail seeking comment. But one person close to Mr. Silver said it was quite possible that the speaker would support several proposals, if not the entire package, including the move to stop counting overtime for pension payments, and requiring employees to contribute more of their own money.

“Shelly is a realist about this, and clearly there is a movement to do something about the pension system,” said this person, who insisted on anonymity so as not to jeopardize relations with Democratic lawmakers in Albany.

A spokesman for Mr. Cuomo, meanwhile, offered words of encouragement.

“As the governor has said since the beginning of his campaign, he is committed to reforming the pension system in order to reduce costs,” the spokesman, Josh Vlasto, said. “We have discussed the mayor’s pension reform proposal with his staff and are reviewing the details.”

But one union official was irate after listening to Mr. Bloomberg’s proposal.

The official, Harry Nespoli, chairman of the Municipal Labor Committee, an umbrella group of unions, said that Mr. Bloomberg had become “a dictator” and that “the mayor has set back labor relations 40 years.”

Not long ago, Mr. Bloomberg was viewed as a reliable ally of labor. He offered generous salary increases in contract negotiations, and spoke with pride about the city’s municipal work force, which is now about 300,000. In 2008, as part of a merit-pay agreement with the teachers’ union, the Bloomberg administration shepherded a pension package through Albany that allowed teachers to retire five years earlier than before, but with full pension benefits.

And in late 2008, just as the financial crisis began to explode, Mr. Bloomberg granted 4 percent raises for two consecutive years to the city’s largest municipal workers’ union, District Council 37, without extracting support for pension givebacks.

Mr. Bloomberg’s assiduous courting of labor paid political dividends: after getting virtually no labor support in his first campaign in 2001, he picked up dozens of union endorsements in his third-term victory in 2009.

But in recent years, Mr. Bloomberg has talked increasingly about the dangers of rising pension and health care benefits. And in his State of the City address, he vowed to make pension reform his top priority in Albany, and promised not to sign a contract with salary increases unless accompanied by reforms in benefit packages.

Property Tax Ploy

Late Friday, Gov. Andrew Cuomo of New York sent a radical bill to cap property taxes to the State Senate. It would devastate school districts in the state. The bill, which exempts New York City, was passed by the Senate on Monday.

But Democrats in the Assembly are rightly startled by a provision that would require a 60 percent majority vote for local property tax increases that exceed 2 percent. That would give people who oppose school spending more voting power than people who support it. It would also leave struggling school districts with no increase if voters rejected an increase twice within a given year.

The bill would also do away with the traditional school budget vote and require districts to simply ask voters to support a tax increase. That would make new school financing virtually impossible in many of the poorest communities. Unlike New Jersey’s tax cap, this one does not have exemptions for health care, pensions, debt service or increased enrollment. Mr. Cuomo has said he wants to change state law to lift these onerous and costly requirements for local districts. That should come first.

The governor’s motives for bringing out this bill now are unclear. Does he want political points for introducing a tough bill that can never go anywhere? If so, that is one of the oldest ploys in Albany and certainly at odds with Mr. Cuomo’s promise of a new New York.

Does he want to force Democrats in the Assembly to approve the bill after he and the Senate have given their approval. The Assembly speaker, Sheldon Silver, who can stall or block anything if he wants, should not be talking about compromise, as he has been. But, rather, he should block any Senate bill along these lines.

The entire charade fails to focus on the real hazards tucked in the 74-page bill. A property tax cap, by any standard, is a blunt instrument. It mainly squeezes poorer districts where schools lose teachers or advanced programs because voters reject a tax increase. Wealthier districts more often vote for property-tax increases to pay for better schools or other services, thus widening the gap between schools in poorer or richer areas.

Mr. Cuomo’s tax cap effort is a bad bill that promotes a bad idea. People do need property-tax relief but not another state law that makes matters worse.

GOVERNOR CUOMO’S 2011-12 EXECUTIVE BUDGET PROVIDES TRANSFORMATION PLAN FOR A NEW NEW YORK

Governor Andrew M. Cuomo today unveiled a proposed 2011-2012 Executive Budget that transforms the state budget process to conform to fiscal realities and eliminates a $10 billion dollar deficit without raising taxes or borrowing.

(BALCONY Member comments are linked below this article and here: Comments)

“New York is at a crossroads, and we must seize this opportunity, make hard choices and set our state on a new path toward prosperity,” Governor Cuomo said. “We simply cannot afford to keep spending at our current rate. Just like New York’s families and businesses have had to do, New York State must face economic reality. This budget achieves real, year-to-year savings while restructuring the way we manage our state government. This is the first step toward building a new New York.”

Our state spending has grown at over 5.7 percent per year over the last decade outstripping tax receipts (3.8 percent), personal income (3.7 percent), or inflation (2.4 percent). Not only do we spend too much, but we get too little in return. Our state is number one in spending on education and number 34 in results. We are number one in spending on healthcare and number 21 in results. The goal is to return fiscal responsibility to the state so that we may strengthen the economy and create jobs.

A key step in beginning to redesign and realign New York’s government is taking a look at the process used to create the budget.

First, we are redesigning how the budget is created. We are rejecting a system of automatic and unrealistic budget increases that, for years, has caused spending to skyrocket to unsustainable levels.

Second, the process is not just a budget exercise, it must be a management exercise. That means that we cannot just keep throwing money at the problem. More funds does not mean better healthcare, or better schools or better programs. The changes must start with a look at the programs: do they work for the patient, the student, or the New Yorker.

Third, we must work together to fix the dismal financial situation we are in. That means bringing stakeholders to the table, making everyone part of the solution. From Medicaid to education to government reform to mandate relief, government cannot do this alone. That’s why the Governor appointed key working teams in Medicaid redesign and local mandate reform. He also created the SAGE commission on government efficiency to revamp the state government structure.

Fourth, in order to lead by example, we have made the largest percentage cuts in state operations reducing general fund spending by 10 percent. Though there is much pain to go around, this decision spares local governments the worst of the budget cuts.

Governor Cuomo’s Executive Budget proposal eliminates the projected 2011-12 gap with $8.9 billion in recurring spending actions, or nearly 90 percent of the total plan. The remainder of the gap is eliminated through $340 million of revenue enhancements, such as tax modernization to improve collections and lottery proposals; one new fee; and $805 million in non-recurring actions. This budget proposes gap-closing actions in almost every area of state spending and includes year-to-year reductions in the two largest drivers of State expenditures, Medicaid and School Aid.

State Operating Funds spending increases by 1 percent while all governmental funds spending declines by 2.7 percent. As the Governor has made clear, closing the gap means cutting growth in projected spending. Without actions, spending was projected to grow by 12 percent, due largely to provisions in state law mandating higher spending. This has become an unsustainable process. This budget is designed to reduce or eliminate the impact of many of these provisions and recalibrate spending to sustainable levels to help repair New York’s fiscal condition.

With these actions, the Executive Budget proposes

•All Funds spending of $132.9 billion in the fiscal year that begins April 1, 2011, a decrease of 2.7 percent or $3.7 billion from 2010-11.
•State Operating Funds spending of $88.1 billion, an increase of $900 million, or 1 percent. State Operating Funds exclude federal funds and long-term capital spending.
•State Operating Funds is adjusted to reflect the loss of significant one-time federal funding received in 2010-11 to cover Medicaid costs normally paid from State funds and other actions, as well as other extraordinary expenses, the Executive Budget would increase State Operating Funds by 1 percent.
The actions proposed in the Executive Budget reduce the projected four-year deficit by 86 percent, from $64.6 billion to $9.2 billion. Following the Executive Budget, the projected budget gaps drop to $2.3 billion for 2012-13, $2.5 billion for 2013-14, and $4.4 billion for 2014-15.

Redesigning and Rightsizing State Government

Reducing the Cost of State Government. The Governor’s budget proposal reduces General Fund State Operations spending by 10 percent at State agencies. Commissioners and agency heads will be instructed to maximize savings in non-personal services. To achieve the rest of the savings, the Governor intends to seek a partnership with the State employee labor unions to seek savings in personal service spending in a way that causes the least disruption to State employees while ensuring the continued provision of necessary services for the citizens of New York. Management employees would also contribute to these savings. If workforce saving cannot be accomplished jointly, as a last resort up to 9,800 layoffs would be necessary. Contracts covering the vast majority of State employees are up for renewal at the outset of the 2011-12 State fiscal year.

Merging and Consolidating State Agencies. The Executive Budget proposes to merge or consolidate 11 separate State entities into four agencies to streamline and eliminate duplicative bureaucracy, better align State responsibilities with need and improve services through superior coordination. Proposals include merging the Department of Correctional Services and the Division of Parole into the new Department of Corrections and Community Supervision; consolidating the Office for the Prevention of Domestic Violence, the Office of Victim Services and the State Commission of Correction into the Division of Criminal Justice Services; merging the Banking and Insurance departments and the Consumer Protection Board into a new Department of Financial Regulation; and consolidating the New York State Foundation for Science, Technology and Innovation into the Empire State Development Corporation.

Reducing the Size of State Government. To help redesign and transform government, Governor Cuomo has created the Spending and Government Efficiency (SAGE) Commission. As part of this effort, Governor Cuomo has directed the Commission to make recommendations to reduce the number of agencies, authorities, and commissions by 20 percent over the long term. The SAGE Commission is directed to submit to the Governor a rightsizing plan to reduce the number of agencies by May 1, 2011. Under legislation proposed by the Governor, the Governor would then submit the rightsizing plan to the Legislature for action with the plan going into effect pursuant to a resolution of the Legislature.

Reducing Excess Capacity. The Governor’s Executive Budget proposes to reduce excess capacity in prisons, youth detention and mental hygiene facilities. Governor Cuomo will reduce excess capacity using rational processes and will propose to eliminate the statutory 12-month notification prior to closures. Actions for youth and mental hygiene facilities will be taken following careful analysis of vacancy rates, service utilization, and other factors. For prisons, actions will be implemented pursuant to recommendations of a task force created by Executive Order to examine excess capacity and recommend specific prison closures of the enactment of the bill appropriating funds for State operations. If the task force does not recommend a sufficient plan of action, the Commissioner of Correctional Services would implement facility closures. Recognizing the impact of facility closures on host communities, the Executive Budget directs $100 million in economic development aid for affected areas.

Medicaid
With the Executive Budget, Governor Cuomo is advancing a new and inclusive approach that will bring New Yorkers into the process of developing proposals to provide critical health care services at lower costs. Following years of unsustainable growth, the Executive Budget reflects a year-to-year All Funds decrease of nearly $1 billion ($982 million), or two percent, in Medicaid spending in 2011-12.

Gap closing actions totaling $2.85 billion for 2011-12 will be advanced by the Medicaid Redesign Team. Established pursuant to Executive Order No. 5, the Medicaid Redesign Team’s 27 members will bring vast experience as health care providers, consumers and industry experts to address the challenge of refocusing our health care system to provide quality health care at lower costs. The team, which also includes State legislators, is conducting a comprehensive review of New York’s Medicaid Program and is to report its findings and recommendations for cost reductions to the Governor by March 1, 2011 for consideration in the budget negotiation process.

In addition, these proposals will limit future Medicaid Program State Funds growth to the 10-year rolling average of the medical care component of the Consumer Price Index (currently four percent).

Education
Education in New York is financed primarily through a combination of State and local funding. Under current law, school aid was slated to grow at a rate of 13 percent in 2011-12. The Executive Budget proposes School Aid of $19.4 billion for the 2011-12 school year, a year-to-year reduction of $1.5 billion. This represents a reduction of only 2.9 percent of the total operating expenditures projected to be made by school districts statewide during the 2010-11 school year, and 7.3 percent in State support. After these reductions, which represent $2.85 billion of gap-closing benefit for the State Fiscal Year, School Aid will continue to represent the largest State-supported program, accounting for 29 percent of General Fund spending.

To help achieve the Governor’s goal of encouraging efficiency and results, the Executive Budget allocates $250 million to be awarded on a competitive basis to school districts that demonstrate significant improvement in their student performance outcomes and another $250 million to be awarded on a competitive basis to school districts that undertake long-term structural changes which reduce costs and improve efficiency.

The Executive Budget’s School Aid proposal includes a $2.8 billion Gap Elimination Adjustment (GEA) for the 2011-12 school year that would help achieve a balanced budget through reductions in school aid on a progressive basis, accounting for each school district’s wealth, student need, administrative efficiency and residential property tax burden. The size of the GEA in part reflects the loss of $1.3 billion in one-time Federal funding provided by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 and the Education Jobs Fund of 2010. The GEA is partially offset by $305 million of growth in existing expense-based aids such as Building Aid, Transportation Aid and BOCES Aid.

The budget modifies transportation aid to encourage shared services and other cost-effective practices, and includes $696 million available from the Federal Race to the Top program, which is also designed to reward student performance. To limit school aid growth in future years, the budget proposes a new Gap Elimination Adjustment formula in permanent law that limits growth in the out-years based on the growth in personal income.

Regional Approach to Economic Development
The Executive Budget establishes 10 Regional Economic Development Councils, which will be chaired by Lieutenant Governor Robert Duffy, to create a more regionally-based approach to allocating economic development funding and to act as one-stop shops for all State-supported economic development and business assistance programs in each region. Recognizing that strategies to revitalize different parts of the State depend upon numerous factors unique to each region and that the best ideas come from the people who live in those regions, Governor Cuomo is proposing a process that will include and engage local stakeholders in developing and executing sustainable long-term, regional economic development strategies.

The Executive Budget reprograms more than $340 million in existing economic development capital resources for major regional initiatives. Besides assisting communities affected by state facility closures, these funds will be used to provide more than $130 million for competitively determined economic development projects put forward by the Regional Councils, $100 million for the Metropolitan Transportation Authority’s capital program and $10 million towards the State’s existing commitment for the New York City Empowerment Zone. The Executive Budget also strengthens the Excelsior Jobs Program, which was created in 2010 to provide job creation and investment tax credit incentives to businesses in targeted industries.

Restructuring Aid to Encourage Results and Efficiency
One of the guiding principles of Governor Cuomo’s Executive Budget is that government must become more efficient and demand results. The budget proposal redirects formula and reimbursement aid into competitive grants in a number of areas and encourages community solutions rather than State mandates. These include:

•Funding of $79 million for programs designed to encourage and reward local governments that consolidate or achieve efficiencies and performance improvements. That includes $35 million for Citizen Empowerment Tax Credits and Citizens Re-Organization Empowerment Grants and $40 million for the Local Government Performance and Efficiency Program. Of the Citizen Empowerment Tax Credit, at least half of the bonus the program provides to governments that consolidate – 15 percent of the combined entities’ tax levy – would have to be used toward local property tax relief.
•Redirecting a portion of mental hygiene funding from State-operated services to community-based programs to improve the quality of care for this vulnerable population.
•Converting a portion of current formula-based funding for agriculture and markets research, economic development, local government and juvenile detention programs into competitive, performance-based funding program.
Juvenile Justice Reform
Governor Cuomo is proposing significant reform of the State’s juvenile justice system and greater use of preventive services to generate better outcomes for children and family as well as significant savings. These reforms will redirect savings achieved by right-sizing State facilities and reducing unnecessary juvenile detention into more effective and lower cost community-based alternatives.

The budget invests savings achieved through the right-sizing of State youth facilities and local detention operations into community-based programs that better meet the needs of troubled youth.

Higher Education
To address the state’s fiscal challenges, the Executive Budget proposes reductions in the State University and City University systems. The Executive Budget reduces base per-student operating aid for community colleges by 10 percent and SUNY and CUNY operating aid by 10 percent, and eliminates the subsidy for SUNY’s three teaching hospitals in Syracuse, New York City and Long Island, which accounts for approximately eight percent of overall hospital revenue. The budget keeps TAP benefits at current year levels.

To help the State University of New York (SUNY) more efficiently manage, the Executive Budget includes legislation that would enable SUNY to streamline its procurement processes and provide SUNY greater flexibility to engage in public-private partnerships – flexibility the City University of New York already has.

The Executive Budget extends the Physician Loan Forgiveness Program, the McGee Nursing Faculty Scholarship Program and the Nursing Faculty Loan Forgiveness Program, which provide benefits to physicians who agree to practice in areas with physician shortages and to nurses who agree to serve as educators in nursing programs, respectively.

Comparable to reductions for SUNY and CUNY, the Executive Budget reduces unrestricted financial assistance to New York’s independent colleges and universities (Bundy Aid) by 10 percent, comparable to reductions proposed for SUNY and CUNY.

Assistance to Local Governments
New York has the highest local property tax rates in the country. Recognizing that reducing State mandates is critical to helping local governments lower their property tax rates, Governor Cuomo created the Mandate Relief Redesign Team by Executive Order. This team, made up of representatives of the Legislature, local government, education and private industry, will conduct a rigorous and comprehensive review of mandates imposed on school districts and other local taxing districts to identify mandates that are ineffective, unnecessary, outdated and duplicative in order to develop the best and most cost-effective ways to deliver mandated programs and services. The Team will report to the Governor on March 1, 2011.

The Executive Budget reduces Aid and Incentives for Municipalities (AIM) by two percent for cities, towns and villages outside New York City, which does not receive AIM in recognition of the city’s numerous alternative funding sources such as a local income tax. But the budget encourages efficiency and innovation through the competitive award of $79 million for local government consolidation and performance improvements that will help jump-start the Governor’s vision of partnering with local governments to deliver smarter and more effective services to New Yorkers at lower cost.

Environment
The Budget maintains the current year funding level of $134 million for programs supported by the Environmental Protection Fund. Appropriations include $10.8 million for solid waste programs, $52.7 million for parks and recreation and $70.5 million for open space programs.

Transportation
Despite the current fiscal crisis, Governor Cuomo’s Executive Budget continues prior year funding levels for the core transportation capital programs supported by the Dedicated Highway and Bridge Trust Fund, providing $501 million for highway and bridge construction, $363.1 million for the Consolidated Highway Improvement Program (CHIPS) and $39.7 million for the Marchiselli program for local governments, and $16.9 million for Amtrak service subsidies and additional rail capital investments.

The Executive Budget also provides a modest increase in cash operating support for the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) of $43 million, bringing total cash operating support to $3.8 billion, and for other transit systems of $2 million, bringing their combined total to $401 million.

Although the budget also provides $100 million to the MTA’s capital program from redirected economic development funds, it also proposes using $165 million of Metropolitan Mass Transportation Operating Assistance Account funds to pay debt services on State bonds previously issued for the MTA capital program that otherwise would be paid from the General Fund and transferring $35 million in MMTOA funds to the General Fund.

Comments from CSEA

Comments from FPI

Comments from PEF

Comments from New York Nurses

Comments from Comptroller DiNapoli

Comments from NYSUT

Comments from OMCE

Comments from UFT

Comments from New York StateWide Senior Action Council

The 2010-2011 Executive Budget may be found at this location: Budget

BALCONY MEMBERS COMMENTS ON GOVERNOR CUOMO’S 2011-2012 BUDGET

CSEA President Danny Donohue

“There is nothing fair nor shared in the proposed state budget.”

Updated Feb. 1 Gov. Andrew Cuomo has proposed a $132.9 billion state budget with significant cuts in aid to localities, health education and state operations. CSEA is at work analyzing all the ways the Cuomo budget will affect New Yorkers and your communities.

Comments from CSEA

Frank Mauro, Executive Director of the Fiscal Policy Institute

“Our state’s economic recovery cries out for a balanced approach to closing New York’s budget gap. The budget proposed today by the Governor places relies excessively on spending cuts, which increase unemployment and intensify hardships for those bearing the brunt of the recession.”

Comments from FPI

PEF President Kenneth Brynien

“The governor continues to claim that pain will be shared in his budget. The State Executive Budget proposal would cripple public services without asking any sacrifice from businesses, corporations and the millionaires and billionaires responsible for the economic crisis.” (new comments posted March 2, 2011)

Comments from PEF

New York State Nurses Association CEO Tina Gerardi

“While the Nurses Association appreciates the need to rein in spending and combat abuse of Medicaid, we cannot sacrifice our state’s most vulnerable population – the indigent and elderly – to do so. The size of the proposed cuts could mean staffing reductions that adversely affect patient care.”

Comments from New York State Nurses

COMPTROLLER Tom DiNapoli

“For the past four years, I’ve said the state needs a budget that aligns recurring revenues with recurring spending. At first glance, it appears the Governor has proposed a budget that does just that. There are two main concerns: achieving budget balance while continuing to provide essential services that millions of New Yorkers rely on.”

Comments from Comptroller DiNapoli

NYSUT President Richard C. Iannuzzi

“These proposed cuts are significant and, if enacted, would impact the classroom both directly and indirectly. I can’t say that we share the executive’s belief that a cut in state aid this significant — coming on top of a $1.9 billion decrease over the previous two years — can be absorbed without teacher layoffs and the loss of other important education professionals.”

ALBANY, N.Y. March 1, 2011 – New York state would spend $1,500 less on each public school student if the governor’s proposed education cuts and tax cap plan were implemented next year.

Overall, failure to restore the budget cuts and mitigate the tax cap would leave school districts outside of the “Big 5” with a $2.5 billion funding gap, according to research conducted by New York State United Teachers and released today by the union’s executive vice president, Andrew Pallotta. Pallotta is scheduled to testify today at a state Assembly hearing on tax caps.

“The research – based on the state’s own figures – clearly shows that the fiscal proposals currently on the table would have a devastating impact on our ability to provide a first-rate education to the children of New York,” said NYSUT President Richard C. Iannuzzi.

Tax Cap comments from NYSUT.

Budget comments from NYSUT

OMCE Statement in Response to Governor Cuomo’s Presentation of his 2011-12 Executive Budget

OMCE looks forward to working in partnership with Governor Cuomo and his administration to address the challenges we all face. Given the difficulty in keeping competent and dedicated M/C employees and attracting new workers to state government, the time is right to fix the pay inequity between M/C and unionized employees. We spent two years in discussion of these issues with the Paterson administration, to no avail. We look forward to the opportunity to present our proposals for making State government more efficient and responsive while, at the same time, ensuring that M/C employees are fairly and equitably compensated.

Comments from OMCE

UFT President Michael Mulgrew

The governor’s planned cut to New York City schools amounts to about three percent of the school system’s budget. We have every confidence that Cathie Black, whose management skills the mayor has repeatedly cited, will be able to manage a reduction like this without laying off teachers and raising class sizes.

If the mayor continues to insist that cuts in Medicaid and education will lead to significant harm to the city, he should join us in demanding an extension of the millionaire’s tax, whose planned sunset will cost the state billions in lost revenue.

Comments from UFT

Statement by Maria Alvarez and Michael Burgess,
New York StateWide Senior Action Council

While we are pleased that Governor Cuomo has maintained the same level of funding for the major community services programs for older New Yorkers through local offices for the aging, we are distressed that he has chosen to eliminate the NY Connects our Aging and Disability Resource Center which has provided information and assistance to older persons and their families about their long term care options. For the past five years, New York State has invested over $20 million to transform the way local Medicaid and aging offices operate to better coordinate information about the very types of long term care alternatives such as respite care, adult day care, in home services, transportation and assisted living which would allow persons to remain independent and not on Medicaid.

Comments from New York StateWide Senior Action Council

The 2010-2011 Executive Budget may be found at this location: Budget

Statement of PEF President Kenneth Brynien on proposed state budget

Albany – The governor continues to claim that pain will be shared in his budget.

The State Executive Budget proposal would cripple public services without asking any sacrifice from
businesses, corporations and the millionaires and billionaires responsible for the economic crisis.

This Executive Budget calls for funding cuts including as many as 9,800 layoffs and more than 1,600 in
attrition to reduce the work force by more than 11,500 jobs. This in addition to the more than 11,000 jobs
already cut since the fiscal crisis began. This is supposed to be about shared sacrifice, yet this proposal
provides for a tax cut of nearly 28 percent for the wealthiest New Yorkers at a time when we can least afford
it.

Unfortunately when the governor says everyone must share in the pain, he means the workers who provide
vital services and the state’s citizens who rely on them, rather than those responsible for the collapse of the
state and national economy.

We will work with the governor to do our part to help during this fiscal crisis. We have solutions that will
help close the budget gap without gutting state services.

We are willing to sacrifice, but we will not be sacrificed.
PEF is the state’s second-largest, state-employee union, representing 56,000 professional, scientific and
technical employees.