PROVIDENCE – Municipal officials reacted with dismay to a plan released Monday by Gov. Donald L. Carcieri that would close a $219 million shortfall in this year’s state budget by slashing local aid, selling state property, shrinking pensions and postponing the replenishment of the rainy day fund.
The House Finance Committee is scheduled to start six days of hearings on Carcieri’s deficit-reduction plan, formally known as a supplemental budget, at 1 p.m. Tuesday.
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Providence Mayor David N. Cicilline released a statement calling Carcieri’s plan “a disaster” that would force cities and towns to make deep midyear spending cuts or raise taxes.
“As the governor has said himself so many times, ‘as goes Providence, so goes Rhode Island,’” Cicilline said. “I’m sorry to see that his proposed budget does not acknowledge Providence as the economic engine of the state as well the center of jobs, education, arts and culture.”
The mayor added: “Despite this, it is my job to protect the residents of this city and to mitigate the effects of this proposal if enacted. We will marshal our resources to meet this challenge as we have throughout this crippling recession.”
Timothy C. Duffy, executive director of the Rhode Island Association of School Committees, said the governor’s plan calls for a net reduction in state aid for local schools of $20.6 million, a 3 percent reduction, after accounting for savings from the elimination of annual cost-of-living adjustments (COLAs) and advancing stimulus payments.
Duffy put the total amount of local government funding the governor wants to cut at $97.5 million for the current fiscal year, which ends June 30. Carcieri had warned earlier in the year that local aid was likely to take a hit.
“This cut will create an economic crises in every community in the state,” Duffy said. “Local government was not consulted or forewarned about the cuts and school districts will have to find ways to accommodate cuts while complying with state and federal mandates. It is a case of trickle down misery.”
In East Greenwich, officials expressed shock during Monday night’s Town Council meeting about the size of the cut – $660,000, double what they had projected – in the town’s state aid, My02818.com reported.
To help municipalities deal with the cuts, the governor proposed a number of measures, including the repeal of minimum manning requirements for local fire and police departments; changes to municipal pension programs; a 25 percent coshare for public safety employees on their health plan premiums; the creation of a statewide purchasing system for education; and the suspension of the Caruolo Act.
In a memo on the budget proposal written by his spokeswoman, Amy Kempe, the governor said municipal workers should take a pay cut of the same size as those he negotiated with state workers earlier this year.
“I am very appreciative of the understanding by state and municipal employees that we do have good jobs, with good benefits and good working conditions,” Carcieri said. “There are many Rhode Islanders who don’t. And a 3 percent pay cut is a small sacrifice for the greater good.”
The Rhode Island Statewide Coalition, a group that advocates smaller government, released a statement in support of the governor’s plan to eliminate annual COLAs of 3 percent for state pensioners.
“RISC recognizes this is a very difficult budget plan for all communities, but this governor has been left with very few choices,” Harry Staley, the group’s chairman, said in a statement. “It’s time city and town leaders, union leaders and, most importantly, General Assembly leaders, make a choice to face facts that the years of approving unaffordable public employee contracts must now be over.”
