Lawmakers will return to Albany on Monday, looking to trim over $3 billion from the budget before the state goes bankrupt.
Gov. David Paterson is calling for mid-year cuts in funding to school districts and Medicaid as well as other measures, saying, if nothing is done the state will run out of money next month.
But members of the Republican Assembly Conference, while agreeing with the governor’s call to action, have concerns related to how the state got to this point and what the appropriate solution actually is, according to Assemblyman Marc Butler (R-Newport).
“A lot of these issues should have been addressed” during the budget process in April, Butler said in a phone interview.
The budget was formed, in part, by some who hoped the economy would pick up, he added, basically “throw some numbers together and hope for the best down the road.”

See the whole story in Friday's edition of The Evening Telegram.