No Quick Solution To Budget Problem, Lawmakers Say

By Matthew Daly

Associated Press

HARTFORD –– State lawmakers returned to the Capitol Tuesday for a special session on the growing budget deficit. Anyone expecting immediate action on the estimated $300 million shortfall was disappointed.

In fact, when House Speaker Moira Lyons and Lt Gov Jodi Rell gaveled the House and Senate, respectively, each were looking at a sea of empty chairs. Rank-and-file lawmakers had been told to not bother making the trip to Hartford.

No formal debate was scheduled. Legislative leaders did not foresee a vote on a possible budget solution until Thursday at the earliest.

Even so, legislative leaders worked all week – as they have since Gov John G. Rowland called the session late last month.

After a series of closed-door talks, Democratic leaders and advisers to the Republican governor have agreed on about $100 million in spending cuts and increased borrowing to close the gap.

But the two parties disagree sharply where to go from there.

Democrats fret that cutting any more than $100 million could damage key programs the state needs in a sluggish economy such as job training, health care, and a host of other services.

Instead of using more than $150 million in cash from last year’s budget surplus to pay for open space, school construction, and other projects – as Republicans prefer – Democrats say the state should take advantage of low interest rates and borrow the money by issuing bonds.

Republicans call that a delaying tactic that could lead to a repeat of the massive budget deficits of the late 1980s and early 1990s – gaps that led to creation of the hated state income tax in 1991.

“If you ask the average taxpayer what we should do when we have a deficit, they’ll tell us to cut spending – not put it on the state’s credit card,” said Senate Minority Leader Louis DeLuca, R-Woodbury.

But Lyons, the House speaker, said her constituents are telling her not to slash programs at a time when they are sorely needed. The Stamford Democrat issued a statement after negotiations ended Thursday accusing Rowland’s budget chief of asking for untenable cuts in spending.

“There are cuts that we as Democrats will not accept, because they really hurt people,” Lyons said. Women, school children, and the elderly, among others, “need our help now more than ever,” she said.

Budget chief Marc Ryan said Democrats were being irresponsible by refusing to put more cuts on the table.

“I don’t believe we are very close to agreement at all right now,” Ryan said. “All the Democrats want to do is transfer just about everything to bonding. They haven’t agreed to any substantial spending cuts.”

Democrats dispute that and say Ryan and other Republicans are using the projected shortfall to chip away at programs they do not like.

Despite the rancor, both sides say said they are nowhere near the impasse that left the General Assembly in near-gridlock in June. Lawmakers finally adopted a $26.5 billion, two-year budget on June 30 – 24 days after their scheduled adjournment and hours before the start of the new fiscal year.

“The atmosphere doesn’t seem to be as tension-packed” as in June, said Rep. William Dyson, D-New Haven, House chairman of the budget-writing Appropriations Committee.

Still, “old wounds can get reopened real quickly,” Dyson said. “It would not take a whole lot for them to come bubbling to the top – and the issues are very much the same.”

Rowland’s spokesman, Dean Pagani, said the governor considers the delay in achieving a budget agreement “a concern, but not a huge problem.”

Rowland has said the special session should be over by Friday night – a goal both sides say still can be achieved.

“There’s still plenty of time,” Pagani said. “I don’t think anybody expected a budget agreement by the first day of the special session. It never works that way.”

Still, Pagani advised Democrats against a plan – advocated by some in the party – to adjourn the special session without closing the entire $300 million gap.

If that happens, Rowland will act – and all bets are off, Pagani said.

“This is really the Legislature’s chance to be part of this process,” he warned. “If the governor is forced to take steps on his own, it could involve steps that have not been contemplated to this point.”