The potential state deficit may be worse that the $4.3 billion currently being projected by the Spitzer administration, the state's chief fiscal officer said today.
"$4.3 billion is a conservative estimate,'' Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli said in an interview on AM-1300 in Albany today. "The roller coaster of Wall Street is moving in the wrong direction.''
Gov. Eliot Spitzer is due to present his budget plan for the fiscal year that starts April 1 to the Legislature a week from Tuesday. His Budget Division placed the gap at $4.3 billion last fall, as tax revenues began to slip as Wall Street cooled. About 20 percent of state tax revenues are tied to the financial-services industry, by far the most volatile part of the state's financial picture.
DiNapoli wouldn't provide his own estimate, but said the state's fiscal position could deteriorate.
Spitzer has pledged not to raise state taxes, but the specter of a budget gap could mean less aid for local schools and governments, service and job cutbacks or borrowing that fiscal watchdogs say would just make the state's financial position worse in the long run.
Last year's budget battle was vicious. The governor even financed TV spots out of his own campaign fund to counter ads run by SEIU. And that all happened in a fiscal environment that, when compared with the numbers we are confronted with now, was a walk in the park. Add to this the election year dynamic and a GOP state Senate majority in an existential fight for its life, and you have a recipe for profound ugliness.
Buckle your seat belts, folks.
