Rell’s “power grab”
http://blogs.courant.com/capitol_watch/2009/12/rells-power-grab.html
By Daniela Altimari on December 29, 2009 2:34 PM
A coalition of unions representing 50,000 state employees is slamming Gov. M. Jodi Rell’s veto yesterday of the legislature’s budget deficit bills.
The State Employees Bargaining Agent Coalition, or SEBAC, dismissed Rell’s request for authority to make additional cuts to programs and services as an empty gesture.
“Giving the governor more power to make harmful cuts to public services when people are struggling in a down economy would be unconscionable,” SEBAC said in a statement.
Union officials have “repeatedly offered to collaborate with the governor to engage public service workers who have specific insights on ways to increase state government’s efficiency,” the statement says. “These ‘front line workers’ have years of experience in their agencies and have been ready to provide the administration with clear programmatic ideas on how the state can be more effective.”
What about Rell’s efforts to achieve effeciencies?
The union says they are “fruitless.” The Contracting Standards Board, which is charged with devising ways to improve state contracting practices, hasn’t met in all of 2009. And the administration’s decision to outsource services for the Birth to Three Early Connections program is costing the state millions rather than saving needed funds, the union states.
“It is vital that the governor and the legislature address the structural change needed to fix Connecticut’s fiscal crisis,” the SEBAC statement says. “The governor’s proposed Band-Aid not only gives her unusual powers over the budgetary process, it won’t solve the problem. Cutting all appropriations won’t balance the budget. Governor Rell is staunchly protecting multi-million dollar estates from even one dollar in taxes while she cuts programs that provide diapers for struggling families and the state’s economy spirals downward.”
The governor’s office said Rell’s veto messages speak for themselves.
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