LoHud
Albany
State lawmakers planned a marathon session Wednesday night of passing budget bills with the goal of approving New York’s first early spending plan in 28 years.
“We’re going to have a budget; we’re going to get it done,” said Thomas Libous, R-Binghamton, the deputy majority leader. “Our goal is between now and say, midnight, to have a budget in place.”
The Democratic-controlled Assembly and Republican-led Senate started passing budget bills Tuesday night and resumed Wednesday by approving measures that would fund general government operations, public protection and capital projects. Lawmakers in both houses also approved the state’s revenue bill, which includes taxes and fees.
On Tuesday, legislators approved a bill that would merge the state Department of Correctional Services with the Division of Parole and another measure that created regional economic-development councils.
Still left for lawmakers to vote on Wednesday were budget bills that included deep spending cuts to local education aid and family assistance, and health and mental hygiene.
The two bills make up the bulk of the spending for the tentative $132.5 billion budget. Lawmakers and the public have yet to see what specific aid cuts would be imposed on school districts.
The school-aid data could be released late Wednesday or Thursday, officials said.
The budget debate came as hundreds of protesters descended on the Capitol to rally against cuts in school aid and health care, and made a last-ditch effort to retain higher income-tax rates for the wealthy.
Senate Majority Leader Dean Skelos, R-Nassau County, said the budget added back about $272 million in cuts to schools as a way to mainly help rural and upstate school districts. The budget would still cut $1.2 billion to local education aid.
“We’re going to have a reasonable distribution so it’s more in terms of old shares,” Skelos said. “The cuts will be by those traditional shares. Not everything will be restored, but it will be back up to the traditional shares.”
Legislators are trying to beat the clock and pass the 2011-12 fiscal year budget one day early.
The state’s fiscal year ends Thursday at midnight; the fiscal year runs from April 1 through March 31.
The budget hasn’t been approved on time since 2006. In 1983, it was approved early, on March 28.
Gov. Mario Cuomo was in his first year in 1983, and now his son, current Gov. Andrew Cuomo, is seeking to also get an early budget in his first year.
Both budgets, coincidentally, occurred in difficult fiscal times.
“We appreciate the Legislature’s swift efforts and commitment to passing this transformational budget plan,” said Cuomo spokesman Josh Vlasto.
An early budget for Cuomo would be a significant victory as the Democratic governor seeks to tackle the state’s troubled finances.
“If someone had suggested just a few months ago that you would get a budget on time, cut taxes, no new borrowing, get bipartisan support from all over the state, you would have thought it some sort of fantasy,” said Assembly Joseph Morelle, D-Irondequoit, Monroe County. “But here we are.”
Assemblyman Robert Castelli, R-Goldens Bridge, said the momentum was on Cuomo’s side to pass other contentious measures later this year.
“While this year’s budget was one of compromise, it is also a budget passed in good faith: faith that the governor will live up to his promises and work with the Legislature in the coming months to pass necessary reforms such as a property-tax cap, unfunded-mandate relief, Medicaid reform, independent redistricting, pension and medical-malpractice reform,” he said in a statement.
The budget calls for a roughly 2 percent decrease in state spending from the current fiscal year, a $1.2 billion cut in school aid and $2.8 billion in savings from the Medicaid program.
Lawmakers and Cuomo reached a tentative budget deal Sunday evening.
It doesn’t include any new broad-based taxes and lets expire the higher income taxes on the wealthy at year’s end.
Sen. Greg Ball, R-Patterson, said dumping the higher income-tax rates is good for the economy.
“It’s not a millionaire tax,” Ball said. “It’s a job-killing tax.”
The budget continues to face strong resistance from education and community groups.
Led by the union-backed Alliance for Quality Education, protesters are planning to camp all night at the Capitol to oppose the budget and “bear witness to the votes on this painful budget that includes huge cuts for children, families, seniors, schools and communities combined with a $4.6 billion tax cut for the wealthiest 3 percent of New Yorkers,” the groups said.
About 300 protesters clogged the hallways of the Capitol and the flight of stairs known as the “Million-Dollar Staircase.”
State police closed the hallway to the Senate chamber and the public viewing galleries of both the Senate and Assembly.
Lekia Hill, a Yonkers resident in Albany to protest the cuts, said her fifth-grade son could lose his bus ride to school if the cuts were approved.
“We’re losing transportation, so that’s a huge deal to me,” she said. “I don’t know how my son is going to get to school if I have to get to work.”
The protesters planned to bring more than 70 pizzas and S’mores and to have breakfast there tomorrow morning.
“New Yorkers from every part of the state are outraged that the budget will sacrifice our kids’ education in order to give another tax cut to millionaires,” said Karen Scharff, executive director of Citizen Action of New York, an advocacy group.
