The Growth of Good Paying Jobs

By Tom Casey

A. Careful Investment of public dollars B. Aggressive Business Support C. Reduction of Energy Costs D. Workman's Comp Cost Reductions E. Reduction of the Highest combined Local/State Taxes in the Country

A. Careful investment of public dollars through local business oversight committees to spur good paying job growth (not "silver-bullet" retail projects that compete with existing retail business and create lower-paying retail jobs) + government subsidies must be limited to proven, good paying, job-creating or preserving investments

B. Aggressive business support by responsive, dedicated, extra-effort business development employees to research and package proposals and to cut through red tape

C. Reduction of Energy Costs - Improve utility efficiency/competitiveness through Public Service Commission regulatory reform for the operation of our granted monopolies including required bidding of service contracts for monopoly areas based on NYS established values of existing infrastructure -- Increase ability of utilities to expand capacity and address transmission bottlenecks -- Reclaim the 70 megawatts of Niagara power given to the entire state for its originally intended use within 30 miles of Niagara Falls

D. Workman's comp cost reduction,
- Increase benefits that have been frozen for 14 years as per Pataki's proposal and expedite delivery -- We lag considerably behind many surrounding states.
- Cap permanent partial disability benefits, as five surrounding states do, and require retraining and return to work
- Research and investigate:
# If administrative costs are excessive and can be reduced
# Would a regional pool for surety bonds for past and future disability help or would the regional cost of administering nullify savings?
# Are insurance profits of 9.9% versus national average of 6.6% excessive due to a lack of competition
# If certification of individual's return to work is accurate and disability appropriate

E. Reduction of the highest local/state combined taxes in the nation by:

1) State Costs

(a) Constitutional amendment to require
-Budget -- limited to a maximum of inflation plus population growth
(Schimminger) or require voter approval +The legislature's objective
should be increases less than inflation for the coming years.

-Debt -- Elimination of all back-door borrowing, define debt to
include all state-funded debt, establish debt cap =5% of personal
income, make debt for operational purposes illegal. To achieve this
debt cap (Hevesi), New York must incur less debt than what would
be allowed annually for a number of years to get our present debt
under the limit

-On time budgets or last year's budget without inflation is automatic,

(b) Budget Reforms
-Balanced budget in accord with Generally Accepted Accounting
Procedures,
-Binding revenue forecasts by third party, independent budget office or
Comptroller.
-Accurate projections of the impact on local governments of all

State budgets and laws
-Adequate review time, no emergency budgets
-Require 4 year financial impact projection by independent budget
office
-Projected new and quarterly budget reports by independent budget
office to the public
-Transparent Budget process, open debate, understandable public
information
-No off budget costs,

(c) Reducing Cost of Medicaid + Full payment by NYS. Monitor effectiveness of Medicaid Fraud Inspector, reduce hiding of assets for nursing homes, require managed care, allow counties flexibility in management and benefits, and review if benefits (optional) are comparable to average private sector insurance? Review eligibility guidelines based on income, residency, marriage responsibilities and residency. As soon as possible health care should be resolved at the Federal level (see Federal lobbying section at end).

(d) Require effectiveness performance assessment of all State Agencies based on costs and analysis by comptroller's office or independent budget office

(e) Significant reduction of "pork barrel" spending to items only with a PROVEN good job creation impact

2) State and local government costs

(a) Pension reform + employees must contribute during all time working if want defined benefit pension; no pension increase if the highest (often) last 3 years base salary is increased with overtime, stipends, or second government job; and no COLA for a number of years.

(b) Amend labor laws where necessary to improve fairness of public sector work force competition relative to private sector counterparts. Have these laws led to a greater number of local government employees than local governments in other states and higher compensation for similar services? Have our laws led to higher compensation and benefits than the same private sector employees as indicated in recent studies?
- Taylor law + reform public sector employee salary arbitration basis from the present comparative public sector salaries and benefits to the governments ability to pay and comparable private sector compensation, and end binding arbitration.
- Eliminate TriBorough amendments that keep existing contracts in force after they expire. This would end pay or step increases and freeze benefit cost amounts
- reduce civil service restrictions on termination for malfeasance and discipline for unacceptable performance,
- Make cost comparisons of government versus private sector services based on an accounting of the full costs including all overhead and equal quality/time completion specifications mandatory. This is now being requested by NYS Transportation employees, excluding explicit requirement of the full cost accounting. Make provision of the services by the private or public sector feasible for municipalities if either can provide the same services for a reduced cost. Examples are garbage collection, social services, education, accounting, fleet maintenance, health care and park maintenance.
- Allow performance based compensation to increase raises of higher performers and reduce the raises of poorer performers relative to negotiated average pay raise + manager decides

3) Local Government Costs (a) No local mandates + Medicaid paid 100% by NYS in exchange for local cost efficiencies

(b) Incentives to regionalize services and merge municipalities if it is proven this will save money