Governor Dannel Malloy, Photo by Chion Wolf
by Diane Orson and John Dankosky - Governor Dannel Malloy stopped by WNPR’s Where We Live to take calls from listeners and to talk about negotiations with state employee unions. His stance seemed pretty clear: Without $2 billion in concessions over the two-year budget cycle, he’s got no more good options for balancing the nearly $3.5 billion deficit.
“You want me to cut the budget more? I’ll cut the budget more. You want me to eliminate more programs I’ll do that. And in the absence of reaching a restructuring agreement we’ll lay off lots of people. I don’t want to do any of those things. Having thousands and thousands of state employees become unemployed in the midst of a downturn in the economy where we can reasonably predict that Connecticut will be one of the last states to recover from makes no sense, but if it’s the only option, it’s the only option to pursue.”
Malloy later told the capitol press corps that he’s working on, in his words, a “nasty and ugly” alternative budget in case state employees don’t agree to concessions.
