PLATTSBURGH — All three North Country lawmakers will vote today to reject the state budget extender that includes furloughs for state workers.
Assemblywoman Teresa Sayward (R-Willsboro) said the extreme step of shutting down state government might be what it takes to force lawmakers to tend to New York's budget business.
She does not think state workers should bear the brunt of political indecision with an unpaid furlough.
SHUTDOWN
Legislators in Albany will vote on Gov. David Paterson's weekly emergency budget extender sometime after 3:30 p.m. today.
The measure requires one unpaid furlough day for 100,000 state employees during each week until the budget is approved.
If the emergency spending plan is rejected, state government shuts down, unable to pay for itself.
WORKERS NOT TO BLAME
"I have voted no on all but one of the extenders, and I will vote no again today," Sayward said before the count.
"First and foremost, everybody believes state workers are all making six figures, and that is not true. Asking state employees who make $10 to $12 an hour to take one day a week off unpaid is unfair — that is two days unpaid per pay period. That's a big chunk to come out of their paychecks because we haven't done our job?
"Why not close down state government for two days? I am guessing if the extender did not go through today, we would be working around the clock to get a budget done.
"The state workers are not responsible for what has not happened here."
PUNITIVE
En route to Albany, Assemblywoman Janet Duprey (R-Peru) said putting people out of work is no way to solve a budget crisis.
"I've been voting against the extenders mainly because they aren't paying our contractors. They shut down all state-funded construction jobs three weeks ago.
"We were supposed to have a budget in place on April 1, and putting people out of work is not the way to solve this fiscal crisis.
"We are supposed to be creating jobs, with federal stimulus money. Instead, we're taking money out of people's pockets — in many cases the lowest people on the (union wage) scale. It shouldn't be a punitive thing, and that's what I think it's going to be, whether the governor intended it to be or not.
"To solve this fiscal crisis, we've got to quit spending money."
NO CONFERENCES
Sen. Betty Little (R-Queensbury) will also vote against the extender bill today.
Spokesman Dan Mac Entee said Little voted for the extenders in early April with the expectation that conference committees — as required by law — would get under way.
So far, not one committee has met in conference.
Inattention has allowed painful proposed cuts to fester.
"In a typical budget year, you have surplus, so it's a matter of what services and programs to spend money on," Mac Entee said.
"This year, due to a $9 billion deficit, the question has become what services and programs are going to be cut. Our hope is that you would have an open conference committee process, so the public (can see) how these questions are being decided."
BUDGET NUMBERS
State leaders don't agree yet on how much money the state has, Duprey said.
"You cannot complete a budget unless the two houses can agree on the amount of money there is to spend. The Assembly (leadership) expects to know what that number is on May 15 — it takes about a month after April 15 tax filing date to find out where the real dollars are that have come in."
Anticipated revenues figures are being reworked this week, Sayward said.
Meanwhile, state government leaders are not fostering any debate on how to revise state spending practice.
"(Gov. Paterson) has not made the effort to call one conference committee together," Sayward said.
"We haven't really seen any language at all out of the Senate as to where they are with the budget. I think we need to do something drastic. Shutting down government would force decisions; it would force us to the table."
SHORT-TERM STEP
Not everyone is opposed to furloughs.
Unshackle Upstate, a bi-partisan coalition representing more than 70,000 employers of 1.5 million workers in Upstate, says furloughs are fine for now, but a long-term solution to the budget problem is needed.
"Unshackle Upstate supports a 10-day furlough as a means to provide a short-term measure to realign state spending, but we believe that ultimately New York state and local governments must move beyond short-term solutions and address the unsustainable growth in government spending," Unshackle Executive Director Brian Sampson said in a statement.
"The state budget is in crisis, and three-quarters of all government spending goes to employee compensation. Across Upstate New York, salaries for state and local government employees are 10-percent higher than the private sector average."
E-mail Kim Smith Dedam at: kdedam@pressrepublican.com
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