Governor Dannel Malloy's Plan B budget options, including 4,700 layoffs of state employees, have received widespread denunciation around the state.
From legislators to state agencies to cities and towns, officials are saying they want to avoid as much as $550 million in potential cuts in the first year that could come if the state fails to reach an agreement with the state employee unions.
The list of options, in addition to 4,700 layoffs, include potentially cutting $482 million in state aid to cities and towns.
Roy Occhiogrosso, the senior advisor and chief spokesman for Malloy, said he was not surprised at the opposition to the proposed cuts because the administration has the same view.
"We don't like it. The governor doesn't like it,'' Occhiogrosso said. "That's why it's Plan B and not Plan A. He doesn't like it. He sure doesn't expect anyone else to like it.''
Malloy's budget director, Ben Barnes, delivered a list of $1.2 billion in potential options that would eventually be pared down by Malloy and the legislature. Under the law, Malloy would need to present his new version of the budget by May 31 in order for the legislature to act by the scheduled end of the legislative session on June 8.
"It is a framework, so the details in all likelihood would change,'' Occhiogrosso said. "The final Plan B [if there is no union deal] would include the least horrible mix of spending cuts, layoffs, and reductions in municipal aid.''
Sen. Edith Prague, a key player as the vice chairwoman of the budget-writing appropriations committee, said the 4,700 layoffs would backfire because the state would be forced to pay the full cost of unemployment benefits directly to the laid-off workers.
"This Plan B takes my breath away,'' Prague said Monday. "It's so unbelievable what it would do to the state of Connecticut. I can't believe these cuts. This is the worst I have seen.''
The options include eliminating the Commission on Human Rights and Opportunities, closing four workers' compensation district offices, shutting down both Governor's Horse Guards in Newtown and Avon, selling the state police helicopter and eliminating all funding for the Office of the Child Advocate.
"I don't mind closing prisons, and I don't mind doing away with longevity pay, and I don't mind looking at some of the outrageous salaries for the fire department at CVH,'' Prague said. She was referring to a story in Sunday's Hartford Courant by Jon Lender that said that the annual wages, including overtime, in the past fiscal year were more than $130,000 each for the fire chief and assistant chief at Connecticut Valley Hospital in Middletown.
Prague also said she has no problem with "taking away cars from state employees who can pay their own gas.''
But the Plan B options, such as shutting down the child advocate's office, are far worse, she said.
With these cuts on the line, Prague says the state employee unions must reach a deal with the Malloy administration in closed-door talks that have remained secret even from legislators.
"Even as chair of the labor committee, I have not heard one word'' about the union talks, Prague said in an interview. "As strong as a union person I am, I am convinced the unions are going to have to have to do givebacks. You can't do 4,700 layoffs - totally unthinkable.''
Larry Dorman, the chief spokesman for the state employee coalition that is known as SEBAC, said the two sides worked throughout the Mother's Day weekend but no deal has been reached. The unions, he said, are trying to avoid the Plan B cuts.
"Any time you're talking about mass layoffs and the elimination of services people need, you're going to see something that is disastrous in the short and long term,'' Dorman said. "We're focused on Plan A.''