By Jill Colvin
DNAinfo Reporter/Producer
MANHATTAN — Mayor Michael Bloomberg tried to convince Albany lawmakers to restore drastic cuts in proposed state funding to stave off thousands of layoffs and service cutbacks in testimony delivered in front of the state legislature Monday.
Bloomberg argued the budget unveiled by Gov. Andrew Cuomo last week would strip the city of $2.1 billion in much-needed funds, including $1.4 billion in education aid and more than $300 million in social services funding that had previously been committed by the state.
The cuts would leave the city "with enormous holes in our budget," Bloomberg told the State Assembly Ways and Means Committee and the State Senate Finance Committee, warning that unless funding was restored or other sources of income were found, the city would be faced with the "prospect of heavy layoffs, especially in our schools."
But State Budget Director Robert Megna said that Bloomberg should have expected the cuts.
"Given the fiscal situation facing the city, state, and nation, it was obviously not realistic to assume an increase in funding in the 2011-2012 budget," Megna said in a statement issued following the hearing, which noted that the budget actually gave the city $579 million less in education aid than it received last year.
The governor's team has maintained that the city has other ways to cover its cost without firing teachers.
Bloomberg began his testimony by sympathizing with Cuomo, saying the new governor had inherited "a miserable budget situation."
But he said the city had been forced to shoulder too much of the burden, including a $300 million cut in revenue-sharing, versus the two percent the budget cut from other cities and towns.
Megna said the city received no revenue sharing cash last year, so that no money was cut.
But Bloomberg spent most of his time in front of the committees trying to convince lawmakers to support a series of controversial reforms that must be passed by the state, including new hiring practices that would make it easier for the city to fire workers and new pension rules that would allow the city to hike the retirement age and eliminate $12,000 holiday bonuses.
He said that eliminating the bonuses alone would save the city more than $1 billion a year — "the equivalent cost of more than 10,000 teachers, police officers, firefighters, sanitation workers, and correction officers," Bloomberg told the committees.
"We have to make a choice here, which do we want to do?" he asked.
The proposals have been met with strong opposition from labor unions.
Bloomberg also pressed lawmakers once again to repeal the "last in, first out" policy that required the city to fire the most recently hired teachers first.
"If you act, I promise you every student will thank you," he said. "Every parent will thank you. Every teacher who works hard and performs well will thank you. And I will thank you from the bottom of my heart for allowing the progress in our schools to continue."
Bloomberg is set to release his preliminary budget for the upcoming Fiscal Year next week.
