The Empire Page

In a previous article about John Faso and his ideas as to how to repair New York’s fiscal crisis, I promised to provide you with his six point plan and my thoughts on his six plan and here they are:

One: Governor Paterson should ask the Legislature to declare a fiscal emergency authorizing him to freeze scheduled salary and benefit increases to all public employees in the state.

I highly recommend this action and I actually have recommended it myself in a previous article. As he points out in his article, there is precedence for this type of freeze. It was done by state law for New York City in the 1970s and for Buffalo earlier in the decade. Public employee salary increases are estimated at $2.5 to 3.0 billion statewide. The freeze would significantly reduce future year budget gaps.

I agree with this totally.

Two: Freeze state aid to schools for at least the next two years. However, school districts can manage this only if wages and benefits, which represent 75% of school spending, are frozen as well. The only alternative to a pay freeze would be damaging layoffs of teachers.

This makes sense to me since school districts, like every other private and public entity, should properly manage their resources and should be able to make cuts when needed. State aid for schools is not entitlement to unbridled spending.

Three: Enact a less generous pension plan for new public employees. This would save approximately $50 billion over the next 30 years and help ensure long-term fiscal health for the state and local governments. In addition, overtime should be eliminated in calculating pensions.

I totally agree with this point, and specifically with the elimination of overtime in the calculation of pensions. For far too long public employees have been pumping up their pensions by working excessive amounts of overtime in the three years before they retire. The allowance of this practice falsely inflates individual pensions at a cost to us all.

Four: Sweep away state laws that only serve special interests and add to taxpayer costs, especially those that are related to labor negotiations and building construction.

To me, this is a no brainer. Special interests have been detrimental to New York State for decades and attempts to change or control them have failed. Maybe with Senator Bruno’s shenanigans coming to light some meaningful change can occur.

Five: Eliminate the ability of the governor and Legislature to incur new debt without voter approval. Take the credit card away from the Legislature and require pay as you go financing for most capital projects.

This is just sound fiscal policy whether it is for New York State or our own households. Borrowing is pyramiding in New York State and is going to place a tremendous tax burden on future generations of New Yorkers.

Six: Adopt a property tax cap, similar to that in place in Massachusetts since 1980. Property taxes in the Bay State are 30 to 40 percent less than those in New York, yet services are as good or better. Limiting property taxes is essential to the state’s economic survival.

 This is one I think every New Yorker agrees with. It is sound policy. Limits must be put on all areas. Without restraints public officials will not be as prudent with the monies that are entrusted to them as if the monies were their own. They should, but history has proven time and time again not to be the case.

 Mr. Faso ends his article with a statement that “the best time to start is now”. I hope Governor Paterson and the other gubernatorial candidates are listening.

 Your thoughts and comments are welcome.

 Doug.boettner@gmail.com