By Joyce Kryszak
Buffalo, NY – A bitterly painful budget process remained painful to the end. Lawmakers spent all day and night before emerging from behind closed doors around 2:00am Friday to approve a $108 million cut package to finally balance the budget.
When all was said and done, 1,600 jobs were gone with another 400 or 500 soon to follow. Countless services are devastated or eliminated all together. The vote was 13 to two. Democratic Majority Leader Lynn Marinelli says this is the new reality.
"Certainly we're here because the will of the electorate spoke through their representatives that we don't want to be taxed and now we have to make due with what we've got," Marinelli said.
But much is missing. Parks remain closed. Mercy Flight funding and school nurses are gone. Snowplowing, road maintenance and a host of other services will be minimal. John Orlando is president of AFSCME Local 1095, representing 1,900 blue collar workers. About 700 are now gone. Orlando says it's complete devastation.
"I believe that for every cut there is here, there is going to be someone in the private sector who will lose his job as well," Orlando said. "This economy can't handle this kind of cut."
Democrat Tim Kennedy and Republican Denise Marshall voted against the measure. Marshall says the cuts were not the right ones.
"This package contains a contingency account for 17 positions the county executive wanted to add back in. Instead of adding the positions, they made an account with those dollar amounts," Marshall said. "I believe those dollars would have been better spent on services for our residents."
More than 100 patronage jobs in the county executive's office and the Legislature were cut. But most jobs were rank and file. Commissioner of Personnel John Greenan has 15 employees left.
"That will make it very interesting when attempting to run payroll, and to do the actual layoffs my department has to process," Greenan said.
Among those pink slips will be $8 million of positions in the departments of the Sheriff, the District Attorney, the Clerk and Comptroller. The officials are still fighting in court to have those cuts restored.