Senate Republicans Present $745 Million In Spending Cuts
June 10, 2010
(New York, N.Y.)-Senate Republicans have sent Governor Paterson $745 million in additional spending cuts to mental hygiene and human services to be included in the budget extender bill to be acted on next Monday. The spending reductions proposed by Senate Republicans include all of what the Governor included in his original budget in these areas, as well as an additional $276 million in spending reductions.
“Governor Paterson challenged us to provide him with more spending cuts and we have done that,” Senate Republican Leader Dean Skelos said. “I expect that he will include our proposed cuts in his next budget extender, and why wouldn’t he? Most of them were in his Executive Budget.”
“Instead of debating budget extenders, we should be debating an entire state budget,” Senator Skelos said. “Unfortunately, due to the failure of the Governor and the Democrat leadership in the Senate and Assembly, the budget is almost two and a half months late, they’ve excluded Republicans from the negotiations and now they are doing a budget piecemeal so we don’t know how each provision in an extender relates to an entire spending plan. They have brought this crisis upon themselves because they failed to get a budget done sooner.”
The proposed spending reductions in mental health and human services Senate Republicans sent to the Governor include the following new proposals (a complete list is attached below):
- Delay the phase-in of new programs and spending that we can no longer afford in human services, the Office of Substance Abuse Services and mental hygiene to save $104 million.
- Delay the 10 percent welfare grant increase authorized last year to save $28 million. The Governor proposed reducing the grant increase by five percent, this proposal would delay it entirely.
- Authorize withholding of a welfare grant for failure to comply with employment requirements to save $12 million. This bill would encourage greater work participation by welfare recipients by withholding grant money if the head of household fails to work.
- Reduce the personal needs allowance for recipients in drug and alcohol rehabilitation facilities to the same amount given to recipients in other types of facilities, such as domestic violence shelters to save $2.2 million.
- Realign earnings limits to reflect the length of time an individual has been on welfare to save $2.1 million.
In addition, Senator Skelos said the Governor should reconsider and include the $400 million in additional Medicaid cuts and reforms proposed by Senate Republicans this week that were rejected by Senate Democrats. They included the following:
- reinstituting asset eligibility tests, face to face interviews and finger imaging for people applying for Medicaid and welfare (saves $34 million in state funds, $89 million all funds);
- placing a cap on personal care services (saves $30 million state funds, $79 million all funds);
- tightening eligibility for certain Medicaid services and enact a two-year asset look back period for home care services (saves $200 million state funds, $526 million all funds)
- Delay scheduled Family Health Plus expansion (saves $80 million state funds, $210 million all funds)
- evaluate and prioritize optional Medicaid services (saves $75 million state funds, $197 million all funds)
- increase co-pay for FHP services to help lower premiums;
- and increase criminal penalties for Medicaid fraud
“We are proposing sensible cuts that will help us close the deficit and get a budget done,” Senator Skelos said. “Taxpayers simply cannot afford to pay to increase or expand these programs and we need to scale them back to save money. Families across the state are cutting back and the state has to do the same. I hope the Governor will include our ideas in his extender.”
Posted by News LI Editor · Filed Under Politics
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