By Heather Grossmann
DNAinfo Reporter/Producer
MANHATTAN — Brother, can you spare a dime? New York sure needs it.
Come the end of December, the state will only have $36 million left in its coffers — and that’s if all resources, including temporary loans, are exhausted, the New York Times reported on Friday.
With a $130 billion budget — the second highest in the country, after California — New York is facing an unprecedented fiscal crisis unless Albany comes up with a budget deal pronto.
But the Legislature does not seem in any hurry to move, and billions in aid to school districts, homeowners and municipalities are at risk.
On Tuesday morning Paterson requested the authority to make unilateral budget cuts, warning, “unless we take action, the state will run out of money,” but the legislature is unwilling to grant him that power.
Sen. Eric Schneiderman said the governor’s proposal appears to be unconstitutional, and worried that the move would just end up in the courts, further delaying a budget agreement.
There are several proposals on the table to close the gap, including forcing Native American tribes to impose cigarette taxes, taking money from authorities and restructuring the state’s tobacco bonds, according to the Times.
But experts are saying that the way the budget deficit is dealt with is just as important as dealing with it.
“If they solve them [budget gaps] with one-time measures, that’s going to increase the gaps in future years, and at some point they get so large it becomes difficult to solve them,” Emily Raimes, an analyst at Moody’s, told the Times.
