State employees rally against furloughs

Story Created: May 10, 2010 at 11:22 AM EDT

Story Updated: May 10, 2010 at 2:39 PM EDT

UTICA, N.Y. (WKTV) - Members of the New York State Public Employees Federation and members of the Civil Service Employees Association held simultaneous rallies outside state offices across New York State Monday, including the State Office Building in Utica, in protest of the governor's furlough proposal.

State employees representing every state agency spent the lunch hour drawing attention to the effect the governor's proposal would have on state services and the state's economy.

Opponent's of the governor's plan say it would reduce state employees' pay by $312 million ($39 million for each furlough day), which they believe would take more than half-a-billion dollars out of the state's economy. They believe that money could be a loss of revenue that has the potential result of more than 17,000 jobs lost, mostly in the private sector.

Despite their strong objections, New York lawmakers are scheduled to vote Monday for the unprecedented furloughs for state workers to contend with a fiscal crisis.

Governor David Paterson is resorting to one-day furloughs each week for about 100,000 state workers after unions refused his earlier requests for lag pay and suspending their 4-percent raises.

Paterson says he will stop the furloughs, scheduled to begin the week of May 17, if unions agree to other concessions.

Paterson wants $250 million in concessions from unions to close a $9 billion budget deficit.
The difficult times have helped make the state budget more than a month late.

Workers will lose one day of work and pay for each week the state operates on emergency spending bills.
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